


Undertale Origins: Chara

by SimonKilnsworth



Series: Undertale Origins [1]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Someone should really tell me what I should put here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-12
Updated: 2017-04-01
Packaged: 2018-08-08 08:11:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 103,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7750054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SimonKilnsworth/pseuds/SimonKilnsworth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The two years I lived with Chara were the best years of my life. Finally I had someone who saw more than the Prince of Monsters, saw more than a child that had to be coddled and handled like some sort of delicate pottery. They saw me. And even after all this time, after everything that happened, I wish more than anything to see them again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The First Human

If I close my eyes, I can almost see that first day again, though the details are not always the same. Sometimes I was the one who was more scared, sometimes it seemed like neither of us were; like we knew from the first time we looked into each other’s eyes that we would be best friends. But I will always remember the way you acted when we first met; that never changes in my memories. You did not see a monster, you saw a person. And even if we didn’t exactly get along swimmingly at first, the way you treated me made me sure you were someone special; made me sure we would be together forever.

In the haze of my memories from countless lifetimes, I can still picture your face in perfect detail. The brown hair that just covered your red eyes, the warm smile that couldn’t hide the pain from your face; though no one seemed to see it but me. Sometimes you would blush when you smiled and that’s how I knew you really were happy; that you had managed to push the memories of your past life as far back as you could, if only for the moment. I’ve kept that image fixed in my mind since this all began. I’ve used it to keep my determination burning in my almost intangible hope of somehow, someday, bringing everything back to the way it was before… Sometimes I wonder if you would be proud of the things I’ve done. Sometimes I wonder if you’ll ever forgive me.

As I think back on those days, I can almost feel… something. I don’t know anymore; it’s been so long. But that tingle I feel running up and down my “body” whenever I play it out in my head, it’s closer than anything else I’ve experienced since I woke up like this. And so I’ll sit in the dark, well away from any interruptions, my eyes closed, and I try to live that life again.

 

I wasn’t supposed to go into the catacombs. No one was, even back then, and especially not alone. The effort to remove as many of the traps and puzzles from within as possible was well under way at that point, but still everyone would talk about how anything could be anywhere in there. The catacombs had been built during the height of monster paranoia when it came to humans and they hid some clever things indeed back then. I once asked my father why he had decided to put them all there instead of throughout the rest of Home. He told me, “Even if they take everything else from us, they will not disturb our dead. They will have the peace they deserve.” I think that’s why it was my favorite place. Magic is a strange thing, and I swear that I could feel the warmth and kindness of all the monsters who called the catacombs their home whenever I was there.

It had been a tough decision to remove all of that protection. It had been debated for as long as I could remember, and it had come down to two points: humans had not made their presence known for almost a thousand years, and calling the process of having to go through and navigate all of those traps as part of the tradition of monster funerals seemed a poor excuse in comparison to their original purpose. And so, all efforts were made to make the place safe to navigate, but after almost a year some were beginning to question if they’d ever finish. Even so, I knew a safe way through.

I knew my mother must not of known about my nightly excursions. If she did, I would not have been allowed to sleep without her in the same room. But, somehow, I suspected my dad knew. Nothing could get past him. He was the king, after all. At least he seemed to understand that I needed some space; some time alone to be me and not The Prince.

I ran from the chiseled stone halls and into the smooth stone caves beyond with a smile on my face and a book under my arm. I had taken to reading in the room where the funerals were held. I read aloud for the spirits of the monsters still there. Everyone said that once a monster died, their spirit was gone as well, but I refused to believe it. I barely slowed for the twists and turns of the tunnels, I had memorized the path long ago. I forget what carried my feet so quickly that day, but something surely did. And I did not stop until I had made it to that room where the crack in the ceiling let in the moonlight over ancient columns and gardens; the sky so close I felt like I could reach out and touch it.

But that night, the moonlight shined down on something else. I ran to the circle in the center of the room. The huddled figure was face down in the grass and did not stir. Turing it over, I almost jumped back in shock. It was a human. And it was still alive. I could see the figures chest slowly rise up and down. But it was hurt. Parts of it were discolored a gross purple with yellow around the edges and a red liquid leaked from its head and made wet spots on its torn clothes.

I shook the human to try to get it to wake up, but nothing happened. I tried again, this time saying, “Hey, are you okay?” Finally, I saw their eyes open. At first they were glazed over, not really seeing anything, but then they snapped to focus and the human pushed itself away from me. It scrambled back to one of the half broken columns near the wall where it tried to hide behind it. “It’s okay. I won’t hurt you.” I tried to assure it. But it just continued to hide behind the pillar of stone.

I had no idea what to do in a situation like that. No monster had even seen a human for hundreds of years and there were few besides my parents that had been alive to seem them in the time before they were sealed off from the world. But everyone said they couldn’t be trusted, that they would kill you the first chance they had, that you should be afraid of them. But this human seemed far more afraid of me, plus it was hurt.

I walked over to the column and poked my head around it to where the human was hiding. “Howdy.” I said trying to sound as cheery as I could. My mom always said, kindness should always be your first plan, for it worked far better than anything else. The human jumped and tried to get to its feet to run away, but it had barely made it a step before collapsing back to the ground with a shriek of pain. I was at its side before I realized it, trying to see if there was something I could do to help. I wasn’t good at any sort of magic, least of all healing, but there must have been something I could do. The human fought back every attempt I made to reach for it like a cornered animal. I shouted that I was only trying to help, but that only made it fight me more aggressively. Finally, I gave up. I put my hands to my side and let the human push itself further back from me.

The human’s eyes darted everywhere and it began to breathe heavily. Every time its eyes met me I could see the distrust they held. Without moving, I said once more, “I’m not going to hurt you.” Its eyes snapped to mine and stayed there. The distrust was now mixed with anger and fear. The human looked ready to bolt in every direction at once. “My name’s Asriel. What’s yours?” The human said nothing, just continued to stare. “You’re hurt.” I continued. “I’d like to try to see if I could help. Is that okay?” The human seemed to see itself for the first time. It looked down at the stains on its clothes and ran a hand along its head pulling it away to stare at the red liquid. “You probably fell.” I pointed up at the hole in the ceiling. “It must have been scary.” I knew I would have been scared had I fallen from that height. I knew I probably wouldn’t have lived through it either. The human seemed unfazed by what I said, however, it just continued to stare at me. “Please, I want to help you.”

The human struggled to its feet, knees wobbling and teeth clenched. I would have ran over to it if I was not sure that would only made things worse. When it was standing, it locked eyes with me once more, anger and hatred overpowering everything now. It took a step towards me and almost fell again, but it somehow managed to stay upright. It took another step, and then another. All the while that hate burned in those red eyes. I almost thought about running, but I was so scared I couldn’t move. The human had almost made it to me. It reached out as if to grab my shirt before its eyes rolled into the back of its head and it collapsed once more.

I waited for it to stir. It did not, and I rushed over to it again. No amount of shaking would wake it up as it did before. The red spots on its clothes looked much larger than they had a moment ago. I had to do something. Should I get help? If I ran home, it may be too late by the time I made it back. I never felt further away from home than at that moment.

Seeing no other option, I wrapped my arms underneath the human and picked it up. God, it was heavy, and I was far from the strongest monster, even those my age. Carefully, I made my way back to the catacombs.

My arms and legs felt weak most of the way back, and I wasn’t sure how I kept putting one foot in front of the other. By the time I could see the tree in front of my home, my vision was starting to blur. The human’s chest had stopped its slow rise and fall. That could not be a good sign. That red liquid had slowly dripped to the ground as I had walked. I was shouting for my parents before I even made it to the door. They ran outside in their pajamas to see what was wrong. And they were beside me as soon as they saw me. I collapsed to me knees and dropped the human, unable to go any further. They stared at it almost as much as they stared at me. “Please,” I wheezed. “Please help them.” They looked at each other in shock for only a moment before my dad took the human in his arms and my mother took me in hers. She was saying something to me, but the words were lost as my vision finally faded to black.

 

I woke up not long after in my parent’s bed. Mom was asleep on a chair next to me, but she woke as soon as I stirred. She practically jumped out of the chair to check if I was okay. Though once she had her hands on me, she seemed unsure of what she wanted to do or say first, so I spoke up. “I’m sorry I went into the catacombs without asking.” Better to get that out of the way as fast as possible.

I expected her to be angry, but she wasn’t. At least not then. She just wrapped her arms around me and said, “That is hardly important right now. I am just glad you are all right.”

“And the human?” I asked once she had let me go. Better to get that out of the way quickly too.

She stood up and paced back and forth a few times before she answered; a sure sign she was worried, though about who or what in that instance I was never able to figure out. “Your friend is… fine. They are sleeping.” I jumped out of the bed only to have my mom catch me before I even hit the ground. “And I do not want you disturbing them.”

“Mom.” I looked up at her pleadingly. “I want to make sure they’re alright. And I wanna be there when they wake up. You didn’t see it; they looked so scared and alone. I didn’t like it. No one should have to feel like that.” I didn’t really expect that to work, once my mom made up her mind, trying to break the barrier would have been easier than trying to change it.

Oddly enough, my mother smiled at me and said, “That is my kind, little prince.” She set me down on the ground and waved a finger under my nose. “Promise me you will not try to wake them up and that you will let them rest.”

“I promise.”

The human was asleep in my bed. It was no longer in its red-stained clothes but one of my striped shirts and pants. The weird, purple parts of it were gone too. My mom was the best in the Underground at healing; I knew she could do it. Somehow, even asleep and no longer in pain, the human managed to look like it was afraid. It was huddled in on itself, arms wrapped around its legs tucked close into its chest, eyes practically squeezed shut. I almost reached out to them, but my mom caught me by the shoulder and shook her head. Instead, I sat down on the floor of my room, grabbed some crayons and started to draw while I waited. My mom closed the door softly after a few minutes.

I must have fallen asleep at some point because I awoke to the sound of my parents arguing in the other room. They never argued. I got up and pressed my ear to the door, but I still couldn’t make anything out. I opened it as much as I could without the door making noise. “… dangerous!” My dad was shouting. “You remember what the humans did to us.”

“But it is a child!” My mom shouted back. “And it has been a very long time since those days. Much could have changed.”

“We know nothing at all about this child, my dear.”

“And that is exactly my point. You should not be jumping to any conclusions before the child has even had a chance to explain their side of the story. Now, on to more important matters. I cannot believe you let our son…”

I felt horrible at that moment. My parents had never fought before, and they were now because of me. Maybe bringing the human back had been a bad idea after all. But I couldn’t just leave them there. Still, the guilt made my chest ache. I could feel tears welling up in my eyes. A stir broke me away from the door.

The human was awake and sitting up in my bed, giving me a look not quite as fierce as they had before. In spite of that look, I smiled and wiped my eyes before saying, “Howdy.” The human slid itself towards the wall without seeming to realize it, all the while keeping its eyes on me. “It’s okay. You’re in my room now.” The fact did not seem to calm it at all. “You collapsed, so I brought you back to get fixed up. My mom’s really good at healing.” It reached up and felt its head, seeming surprised when it did not come away red like last time. “Does anything still hurt? I can get her to try again if it does.” The human shook its head and I couldn’t help but smile. It wasn’t much, but it was a response. “Alright then.”

I sat back down in the middle of my floor. “Do you know where you are?” No head shakes that time, just more stares. But I went on anyway. “You’re in the Underground; the world of monsters. I know that must sound pretty scary, but monsters aren’t very bad at all. We’re all just a bunch of goofballs, really.” I chuckled, but the human still did not react. “You must have fallen down through that hole. How did that happen?” Still nothing. I decided try something else “Are you hungry?”

That got a nod, if after a moment. I stood up fast enough to make the human jump and ran out of the room, slowing when I realized my parents were still sitting at the table in the dining room. They weren’t fighting anymore, but they didn’t look happy either. They broke their silence as they saw me walk in. “What is it that has you running around the house like that?” My dad asked, trying his best to sound happy.

“I was gonna get some food for the human.” I told him.

“It’s awake?” He almost jumped out of his chair, but a stern look from my mom sat him back down. “You’re mother and I will get it something to eat.” He said much more calmly afterwards. “You should get some sleep.”

I shook my head. “I think I should bring it. They’re very scared.” I didn’t know how to tell them that I thought they’re help would only make the human feel worse, but they seemed to understand. They both nodded their agreement and I was walking back to my room with a slice of one of my mom’s famous pies a moment later. It wasn’t warm anymore, but it was still really good either way. I’m not sure why, but I thought to knock before going in. It was my room, but I felt intruding would be rude. And when I opened the door, a wall hit me that I did not remember being there ever before.

I was on the ground with the human on top of me. They had my shoulders pinned and that fierceness was certainly back in its eyes now. Strangely enough, I was more worried about the pie being ruined at that moment than anything. I was scared, certainly, but that seemed to be far away then. Before I could react at all, the humans face changed to one of shock and regret and it jumped off of me nearly as fast as it had tackled me. It then ran over to huddle in one of the corners of the room. When the world seemed to move at a normal speed again, I stood up and looked around for the pie. It was half spilled off of the plate near the wall. I gathered up as much of it as I could, wishing I had actually cleaned my room that morning, and walked over to the human.

The human tried to press itself in the corner as much as possible. It had its arms across its face, trying to him from me. I knelt down a few feet from it. “You must _really_ be scared.” I said, hoping my voice didn’t shake. The human wasn’t the only one scared. “I’m sorry I didn’t realize that sooner. Here.” I slid the plate with the half a slice of pie over to it. “I did the best I could. I’d get another one, but then my parents would know something happened. Don’t worry though; I promise I’ll sneak you another slice later.” The human no longer had its arms coving its face and I winked at it. They seemed confused, though at the time I had no idea why.

Slowly, they reached down and took the plate off the floor. Once it was in its hands, the human ate voraciously and then, just as slowly, put the plate back on the floor. “Do you feel better?” The human nodded. “That’s good. You’re probably still tired. You can sleep in my bed, if you’d like. I’m sure my parents wouldn’t mind if I slept with them tonight.” I started to stand up before I heard a voice.

“Chara.”

The voice was barely a whisper. It was so quite I wasn’t sure I had actually heard it. “What?” I asked.

“Chara.” The human said, little louder that time. “My name is Chara.”

I smiled. “It’s nice to meet you, Chara. I hope we can be best friends.”

A knock came to my door, followed by my mom’s voice. “Is everything all right? We thought we heard a noise.”

“Everything’s fine, mom.” I yelled without getting up. “Chara was just a little scared. But they’re fine now.”


	2. The First Day

Chara, pronounced Care-ah. I can’t tell you the number of times I almost said Char-ah every time I saw it written down. Whenever I asked why it was such a weird spelling, they would always just shrug and say “Humans are weird.”

Chara used that to explain a lot of things, actually. Like why they were always so jumpy around mom and dad, even years later. And why they would get angry sometimes at the strangest things. Like when one of the older monsters told them they’d make a great parent one day. Or when someone tells them “be happy!” or “Don’t be sad.” That doesn’t even take into account how angry they got when someone actually made fun of them. Chara wasn’t one that you teased; they were not quick to forgive when you got on their bad side, and they remembered everything. They held onto their pain long after it was behind them. Maybe Chara thought it was the only thing keeping them alive.

But, in the beginning, I was blind to the pain they hid behind their smile. I was oblivious to the signs they showed. The first human to be raised in the Underground was more of a monster than all of us, and no one realized it. I wish I had. Maybe I could have done more to help them. Maybe then this would have all turned out differently.

The first night we had Chara with us was probably the worst for them, and the first day wasn’t much better. Chara had slept in my bed while I was with my parents. Though, none of us really slept at all. Through the night, Chara woke up screaming twice. It must have been a really bad nightmare, because it took the three of us a long time to calm them down each time. Back then, we just thought they were scared because of where they were.

The whole thing made breakfast the next morning a little awkward. I remember all of us sitting around the table, exhausted, barely touching our food. Mom and dad kept their eyes on their plates. Chara seemed like they were in another world all together. I frequently glanced over to see if anything changed in their expression, but Chara barely seemed to blink. They were only one of us that cleared their plate, though. That seemed to be a good sign. My mom kept trying to break the silence by asking Chara questions. Are you feeling better? Where did you come from? How did you end up here? Do you miss your family? But Chara didn’t even seem to hear her.

My dad tried asking questions as well, all under the guise of explaining Chara’s situation to them. All of the questions earned him fierce looks from mom. Did the other humans teach you about monsters? Do you understand that you’re trapped here now? Do you remember what they did to us? But they did nothing to drag Chara out of their world as well. “Are they finally coming to finish us off?” That last one earned my dad a sharp “Asgore!” from mom. But it didn’t get Chara to say anything either. They just got up and walked away from the table. I heard the door to my room slam before mom told me take Chara and go play outside. She wanted to have a few words with my dad.

Mom explained it to me later. One of the days we were out catching bugs I couldn’t get the conversation out of my head and I asked her why dad hated humans so much. She took her time before answering. Most likely to find the right words to explain it to me. My mom was like that: never one to speak rashly, always one to say exactly what she meant to with no needless extra words. Finally, she looked down at me and said, “In the time before the war, your grandfather was the king of monsters. He and your father fought long and hard to form a peaceful relationship with the humans. There was even a time when he called a human his best friend. In the last battle, your grandfather was killed by that very human. Even after all this time, I don’t think your father ever truly put it behind him.” I told the story to Chara afterwards, but I don’t think it made them feel any better.

It was easy enough to convince Chara to come outside with me. They seemed like they would rather be anywhere than inside that house. I found them just sitting on my bed, staring at nothing again. I tried to ignore the words passing between my parents as we left. That was twice now that I’d ever heard them fight. Both of them were because of me.

Once we were outside, though, Chara didn’t seem to feel like playing anything. They sat down with their back against the tree in our ‘yard’ and watched the colored leaves as they started to fall from the branches. At least Chara acknowledged _my_ presence. “Tag?” I suggested. They shook their head. I was about two thirds of the way through my list of ideas already and not a single one earned anything more than that. “Do you want to play pretend?” Chara paused a moment at that one, but still shook their head. There was only one game I held back from suggesting: hide and seek. I had a sneaking suspicion that if we played that I’d never be able to find them again.

Finally, I gave up. I sat down next to Chara with my back against the tree as well. Like them, I sat watching the leaves for a while until I started to hear a scratching sound. I looked down to see Chara drawing with a stick in the dirt. It was a very simple, stick-figure face, but they had drawn the line for the mouth over and over at different angles, seemingly unable to decide what expression the drawing should wear. The mess actually looked slightly frightening, like their mouth had been taped over or… “Are you alright?” I asked them. “I mean, you’re not still hurt, right?”

“He hates me.” Chara gave as an answer. It was not hard to guess who they were talking about.

I glanced down at the drawing again and then turned my gaze to a different part of the ground. “My dad doesn’t hate you; he just doesn’t like humans much.”

“Is there a difference?” Their voice was fierce, so much so that it made me look up and Chara and I locked eyes for the first time since yesterday. It was the first time they even looked at me today. It was the same look from yesterday too. That determined look of an animal backed into a corner ready to fight off its predators with everything it had masking a layer of fear that almost seemed strong enough to make them tremble.

A part of me realized even then, I think, that that moment was one of great significance. How I answered that question would set the foundation of the rest of our lives together; short as they ended up being…

I looked down again and thought very hard, trying to emulate my mom’s ability with words. “Exceptions.” I said finally.

But Chara didn’t seem to get it. “What?”

“There’s an exception to everything. You can be that exception. So my dad may not like humans, but he can still like you. He just needs to get to know you.” It probably wasn’t the best way to explain it, really, but I think Chara understood. They nodded before falling back into their own thoughts.

I fell into my own thoughts as well. How matters had been going so far, I failed to realize two things. I had been so caught up with everything up that point that the whole of the situation hadn’t sunk in yet. Chara was trapped here. Forever. No wonder why they were worried. I had been trapped under this mountain my entire life, so of course I was used to it. I could only imagine how scary the thought could be for them. Somehow, the more I thought about it like that, the more right it seemed. And the more blind I became to the actual problem. But at the time my mind raced with ideas to incorporate Chara into our family. I could get my dad to like them if given enough time. They would need their own bed, their own clothes. They could share my room, of course. I was planning out our entire lives together.

And that was when I realized the second thing. I was talking about my dad getting to know Chara when I barely knew anything about them myself. It was only yesterday that I met them, and they had said a grand total of thirteen words to me so far. I had been so caught up in my fantasy that it felt like I knew them my whole life. My thoughts went silent. A part of me even wanted to apologize to Chara.

This time it was Chara that broke the silence, though. “I want to play now.” They said. I smiled; it seemed like it was quite the breakthrough.

I stood up and held out a hand to help them up as well. At first they just looked surprised. Then they looked ready to ignore my help and stand up on their own. But finally Chara did take my offer and I lifted them to their feet. “What do you want to play?” I asked.

“Hide and seek.” They said. Of course it was. I was hesitant myself for a moment, ready to suggest something else, but I did not want to back out now when we were just starting to get somewhere. “You hide, I’ll seek.” They suggested. I guess that was a little better.

I nodded and Chara turned to face the tree and covered their eyes with their hands. They started counting and I started running. In the tunnels leading up to my house there are a bunch of cracks and gaps a monster my size can easily fit through. I scanned a nearby one quickly and began to squeeze my way through a gap that would conceal me well enough but would give Chara a fighting chance still. If I really wanted to disappear, I could have.

I was close enough to hear them shout out the end of their count and I inched myself a little further into the gap to make sure I was good and concealed. I waited and listened. Minutes ticked by before I heard the sound of Chara’s shoes crunching on the rock. I stayed perfectly still. They walked right into my line of sight. If Chara just turned their head, they’d see me. There was no way I’d be able to squeeze my way out of the crack in time to run to base before they could tag me. Their victory was assured. But Chara just walked right by without looking my way at all. I waited another minute and started to shimmy out of the gap. When I was free, I turned to Chara, still only feet away, and shouted, “You’re gonna have to try harder than that!”

They jumped and turned and I started to run. I ran back to the tree as fast as I could, laughing to myself as I pumped my arms. I was never fast for someone my size, but Chara certainly seemed to be. When I looked over my shoulder they were already almost right behind me. I tried to go faster, but it made no difference. Chara was gaining on me.

Soon they were close enough to reach out and grab me. But when they swung to tag me out I dodged out of the way. “Can’t catch me.” I teased. They swung again and this time Chara managed to grab my shoulder, hard. They pulled me towards them with enough force to make me trip and before I knew it my feet were off the ground with the rest of me.

The world spun into a blur and then I hit the ground and pain shot itself through my body, white hot pain that made my vision blur. I realized I was screaming before I could stop it. I stopped rolling next. An instant later Chara was standing over me. Tears were already streaming down their face. Their eyes went to my shoulder and their look turn to one of horror. I could guess why. When monsters get hurt, we don’t bleed, we just sort of break down. I could see the white light of escaping magical energy coming from my shoulder even through my spotty vision. I must have landed on a rock pretty hard.

I gritted my teeth against the pain, but I could not fully silence myself. Chara seemed to be mumbling something under their breath. I thought it was ‘I’m sorry,’ but I couldn’t make it out over my own groans. They were looking at me pleadingly now. I can see that expression as clear as day right now. It seemed to say ‘please don’t die.’ But beneath that, even stronger, it seemed to say ‘please forgive me.’

Don’t worry, Chara. I will always forgive you. No matter what you do, I’ll never let it get between us.

My mom appeared over me next and the pain was gone in almost an instant. But I felt tired. She picked me up and carried me back to the house. Chara trailed behind. My mom refused to look at them. I tried to give Chara a reassuring smile, but I’m not sure if I was able to get my face to move.

Healing takes a lot out of us monsters. It’s like whatever magic makes us tick needs time to reestablish itself afterwards. Something minor could keep us sitting down the rest of the day. Something more serious could keep us out for a week or more with no assurance that we’ll actually wake back up. Monsters tend to call that ‘falling down.’ My mom put me down on my bed and covered me with the blankets. She left the room and came back with some food. Chara seemed to be trying to stay as close to me as possible. They were still giving me that look. My mom fed me and I felt instantly better, but I was still pretty tired.

“So, care to explain what happened?” My mom asked both of us, though it seemed to me like her ‘mom’ look lingered on Chara just a moment longer.

“It was an accident.” I jumped in immediately. “We were just playing, Chara grabbed me and I tripped. That’s all.”

My mom turned to Chara. They were crying again and they looked up at my mom like they were somehow in danger. “I’m sorry.” They were saying audibly now, over and over. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

My mom knelt down in front of Chara and they flinched back, looking ready to run or to defend themself. She reached out a put a hand on their face. It elicited a yelp from Chara, but they calmed down when they realized that my mom was simply wiping away their tears. Chara seemed somehow shocked that that was all that happened. “It is all right, child.” My mom told them. “Accidents happen. It is important you learn your own strength, though, so that more accidents can be avoided in the future.” She patted Chara on the head and gave them one of her signature smiles.

Then, Chara did something really surprising. They practically leapt into my mom’s arms and hugged her, crying anew. Once she recovered from her shock, she hugged them back.

Mom left shortly after. Chara came back to stand next to my bed. Their worry was not completely gone yet. I tried to tell them I didn’t blame them either, but I was still so tired I have no idea if I actually said anything or not. I must have fallen asleep at some point because the next thing I knew Chara was under the covers as well, their arms wrapped around me and sleeping soundly. I smiled and held them close as well.

Dinner was much the same as breakfast that day. It started off in silence. Chara sat closer to me this time, seeming to refuse to leave my side. My mom tried to break the silence with questions again and this time Chara answered.

“Are you feeling better?”

A nod.

“Where are you from?”

“The city.” Their soft voice responded.

“Do you have a family?”

Chara looked to me for a moment before shaking their head.

My mom hesitated for a moment, obviously not wanting to step onto any more sensitive topics. “Well, why not tell us a bit more about yourself. What do you like?”

“I like playing with Asriel.” Chara said without hesitation. They even smiled. “He’s nice to me.”

My dad harrumphed and my mom chuckled. I smiled back at Chara just as strongly as they were smiling at me. I had always wanted a brother. And it seemed like that dream was coming true.


	3. The First Adventure

Things were far from perfect, in the beginning. Chara was a puzzle worse than any you could find in the Underground, and right when I would start to think I got a handle on how he worked, he’d do something completely different and I’d have to start all over. It was like walking on broken glass. Sure, you could make it across if you were careful enough, but not without at least a little discomfort, and not without a few scrapes.

Chara and I would butt heads, we’d fight, we’d get angry at each other, but it was never more than that. That first night, Chara made me promise, “I won’t ever hit you if you don’t ever hit me.” It seemed like a strange thing to promise. Was it not a given?

“Why do we have to promise that?” I asked. “Why would I ever hit you?”

“It’s so you can trust me.” He said quietly. “And I can trust you.”

I didn’t really quite get it but, humans are weird. So, I made the promise, and we both kept it. Though, some days I wonder how.

It wasn’t the only problem during those early days. My parents seemed to fight more and more, about every little thing. I hated it. Strangely, Chara seemed more affected by it than anyone else. Whenever he would see or hear them fighting, he would get quiet. As quiet as he had been that first day. And the longer it went on, the worse it would get. He would cover his heads with his hands and just sit on the floor in my room, sometimes for hours. He would do nothing during that time, and would only respond to me by saying, “Shhh.”

I called it ‘the hush,’ and after it happened a few times I learned to just leave Chara be and let him come out of it on his own. When my parents would finally stop yelling, I would go back into my room and sit next to them with my hand lying open between us. I would wait until Chara finally took my hand to tell me he was back. A moment later his arms would wrap around me and he would start to cry. Apologizing under his breath, for what, I don’t know.

Back then, I wanted nothing more than to figure out what made you so sad, Chara, so I could take it away forever and bring it some place it could never hurt you again.

 

“Concentrate.” I told Chara as we sat facing each other on the floor in the middle of my room. Chara had his hands cupped in front of him and was staring at them intently. He had been like that for the past five minutes or so. I could see beads of liquid starting to form on their face from the focus required for trying to hold unmolded magical energy. After another minute or so, he threw his hands up in frustration. He had been having very little luck with magic so far.

“This is stupid.” Chara said leaning his head on his hands. “Maybe I just can’t learn magic.”

“If humans could do it in the past, so can you.” I told him firmly. “Now, watch me again.” I cupped my own hands together and a small flame flickered to life in an instant. I let it die and then did it again. Meanwhile Chara squinted at my hands, trying to make out what it was I was doing.

Chara had an ability I would have thought was impossible before I met him: he can see weaves of magic. Because of that, I thought he’d have a knack for it. But it probably didn’t help that he had me for a teacher. I was never all that good at magic myself. “You’re doing it too fast!” Chara shouted all of the sudden and I nearly jumped. “I can’t see anything like that.”

“Well, I can’t do it any slower.” I told him as I settled myself again. “Just keep watching.” I repeated the steps of making the flame, holding it and letting it go over and over while Chara watched almost without seeming to blink. One of his hands was on his knee, palm up. I could tell he was still trying to do it himself while he watched me.

Then, one of the times I let go of the flame, it stayed there. At first I had thought that my mind had wandered and I had tied it off instead of releasing it, but I couldn’t touch it at all. “I did it!” Chara shouted, looking up from the fire. It died out a moment later, and another formed in his hand. He bounced the flame in his hand and looked up at me, beaming with pride; the largest smile I’d ever seen him make on his face. I shared that smile, but I didn’t feel like smiling. Chara had just taken control of a spell I was working, and that _definitely_ should not have been possible.

A knock came to the door and Chara let the fire go out. My mom poked her head in a second later and smiled at both of us. “I hope you two are ready. Otherwise we are going to be late.”

“How can we be late? They can’t start without us.” I joked. One of the perks of being royalty was that it was really hard to miss anything as odds are the thing wouldn’t happen unless you were there. But it was still rude to make people wait.

“And what kind of example would that set, my young prince?” My mom asked in return. “Come now, your father already went ahead.”

The two of us stood up and followed my mom out into the front room where she looked us both up and down to make sure we were presentable. When she was done, she nodded and together we left for the city. “Promise me you two will both be on your best behavior while we are there, okay?”

“We promise.” I said and Chara gave me a look that said he’d think about it.

The two of us were becoming stir crazy from being cooped up in the house almost all day, every day. And we had made that fact very known to my parents. Finally, after weeks, they gave in and decided to let us come with them to one of the council meetings in the city. I could tell they were nervous about bringing Chara. They gave him one of my thickest shirts to try to block the dim glow of their soul. And my mom wanted us to stay close in case something happened anyway. Yeah, that thought lasted about five minutes in our ten-year-old minds.

Chara and I ran through the crowd as we made our way through the city. Chara laughed as he hid and dodged away from my grasp. We had been doing a good job of keeping our promise until Chara decided to start poking my ears – something he knew full well that I hated – and that was not something I could let go unpunished. More than one startled monster tried to jump out of the way as we ran past. Most of them just ended up tripping over themselves or someone else in the crowd. I shouted apologies as I went by, trying to not lose Chara at the same time. We kept running, until I suddenly realized he had stopped.

A moment too late, as it turned out, I slammed into Chara’s back making us both tumble to the ground. As we pulled ourselves back to our feet we looked at each other and laughed. Then the reason Chara had stopped in the first place spoke up. “Looks like you two are having fun.” My dad said as he looked down at us with a smile that was clearly meant only for me. “Now, where is your mother? You did not leave her behind, did you?”

“No, I managed to keep up, somehow.” My mom said as her shadow descended on us. I suppressed the urge to swallow.

“These two giving you trouble?” My dad went on. Both of my parents were towering over us now.

“Oh, when are they not trouble, my dear?”

My dad made a sound that could have been a laugh, but I wasn’t sure. “Indeed. Well, it looks like they’re almost ready. Shall we head over?”

The council meetings were held in large amphitheater on the far side of the city from our house. Like much of the city around the edge of the dome, it looked to be grown out of the rock itself. The theater was enclosed within a massive building that was surrounded by rooms where monsters from other parts of the Underground could stay before the meetings, courtyards to enjoy a little taste of what we thought the world above must look like, and small sitting rooms for more private meetings between delegates of individual cities or simply friends who wanted to catch up. The council as a whole only met a few times a year as it was difficult to get everyone there all at once. There were over five hundred representatives for the various different types of monsters. My mom was making me memorize them all as part of my schooling, but unless I was looking at them, at the time I don’t think I could have listed five.

“What do they talk about?” Chara had asked although he didn’t seem to really care.

“A bunch of stuff, really.” I told him. “Anything that comes up that someone sees as a problem or may become a problem. All I know that they’re going to be talking about this time is about moving where the council is held after this.”

“Why’s that?” At this point, Chara was flicking my ear again and I was trying my best to ignore it.

“Because, the new city that was built on the other side of the Underground is bigger and it’s closer to most of it too.”

“So move it. Makes sense to me.”

I snatched his hand out of the air before it could touch my head again. Chara let it drop without argument. “It’s not that simple.” I explained. “This city is still our capital and there’s a significance to that; a symbolism that plays on a monster’s morale. My mom thinks my dad named this place Home just because he’s bad at naming things, but I see a deeper meaning to it. After monsters were driven underground, we felt hopeless. This city shows that we’re capable of bouncing back; that we’re capable of making the best out of the worst. New Home is just a reminder of how small this place really is…” I noticed Chara was giggling at me. “What?”

“Nothing,” he said, though he made no effort to stop himself. “I just forget how smart you are sometimes.” He gave me a smile and I smiled back. I knew Chara hadn’t really absorbed more than a word or two of what I said; he just liked hearing me talk. I didn’t blame him though. After all, he didn’t have to inherit a kingdom one day. I was only thinking about dragging him into it with me at the time. Then he surprised me by saying something that made me think he actually was paying attention, “The meaning of things can change, though. Everything changes.” He told me. “You have no power over this world.”

No…

No, that wasn’t him…

…

Why did I think…?

…

Then what did he say? What did he…?

…

…

Nonononononononono NO! WHY CAN’T I REMEMBER?

…

No, it’s alright. It’s not important. But why can’t I remember…?

As we made our way to the theater, many monsters approached us. No monster was ever afraid to speak their mind around us, not that I could ever remember, though I noticed they did act slightly differently when they were around my parents versus just me. Everyone had a lot of questions when they saw Chara. My mom was vague with her answers without actually lying to anyone. Chara came from far away, he came to us sort of on accident, he was quiet and did not really tell us much but we took him in all the same. The conversations never lasted long as Chara would try to make himself disappear behind either me or my mom. Humans made me have to redefine my definition of ‘antisocial.’ A lot of the monsters would try to ask him stuff anyway. And when he didn’t simply yelp and duck his head, the stammered and mumbled responses didn’t really leave anyone satisfied.

Eventually, everyone left almost the same way: feeling a little awkward. Though, not for the reason of Chara’s silence. With nearly every monster that came to us I tried to interrupt the conversation between the adults to see if anyone would want to play with me sometime. Most of them were with their parents, and they even seemed eager. But no plans were ever made, and it was not the fault of the other monsters, it was always my mom who came up with some excuse as to why I or they could not make it work. And, of course, the other monsters would agree before I can put up any sort of argument.

“What was that about?” Chara asked me after one such conversation that left me with my teeth clenched. It was an odd pair – a Loox and a Whimsun – which I had tried to convince everyone to let me play with once the assembly was over.

“Most monsters don’t let anyone play with me, because, God forbid, if I get hurt at all my dad will come down on them with the same rage he had employed when he fought the humans centuries ago.”

“That is not the reason and you know it, Asriel.” My mother chimed in, overhearing us. My father was far head again, walking along with a group of monsters that were talking to him about one issue or another; something to do with a second exodus from the city, if I remembered anything about his current company. “And I will not have you speaking ill of your father like that.” She went on.

“I don’t get it.” Chara mumbled.

My mom stopped and knelt down in front of Chara. He still sort of flinched back when she did, though not as much as if it were my dad. “Asriel is not as strong as other monsters.” I groaned, but she ignored me. “And because of that, it is necessary to avoid unnecessary risks. It is only because he is young. His father was the same way when we were kids, if you can believe it.” She gave him a smile and that was unfortunately the end of it.

The closer we came to the amphitheater, the more monsters seemed to be heading towards it as well. In addition to the representatives for certain groupings of monsters, anyone was allowed to attend and participate, voicing comment or concern in a setting where everyone can be on the same page at the same time.

You’d think that by now, with all of our magical prowess, that we’d have some better form of communication in place, but I just think we like to talk face to face.

When we finally reached the entrance, the crowd around my dad went their separate ways and he rejoined us. We took our normal route to the entrance. It was a different way than all of the other monsters went, so we had a little privacy. I filled the time walking down several hallways and flights of stairs point out various things to Chara, explaining who made them and why. The halls were filled with statues and other artwork that had been added over the centuries. My mom would chime in and correct me when I got any details wrong. Chara would chime in sometimes as well, telling us which of the pieces were done with magic and which were done by hand. Whenever he did I would always catch my parents freezing up a little.

When we finally made it to the door to the arena, my mom turned to me and said something that took me off guard: “Why don’t you and Chara play out here? This meeting should not be very long, we think.”

This was surprising because my parents had made me sit in on every single one of these meetings since I was old enough to comprehend what was going on. It surprised me enough that I asked. “Why can’t Chara come in with us?”

I knew it was the wrong thing to ask almost as soon as I said it. My parents said nothing, their eyes merely shifted to Chara for an instant before I nodded my head reluctantly. I understood, but I didn’t like it. And I could tell by subtle change in Chara’s expression that he understood too. _What could I do to help him fit in?_ I remember asking myself. _What could I do to remove centuries of stigma against humans from the souls of monsters?_ I would have done anything to achieve that goal back then.

The moment my parents disappeared behind the door, Chara began to wander off down one of the hallways and I caught up as fast as I could. I tapped him on the shoulder, but he didn’t respond. “Hey,” I tried, but he still just kept walking. “It won’t always be like this.” I tried as well. Chara shrugged; at least that was getting somewhere.

Maybe something else would work better. “Hmm,” I started, tapping my chin with my finger. “Now I have nothing to do in this giant arena full of interesting places to explore and it looks like no one will want to play with me. Oh well I’ll go off alone and tell my estranged brother about all of the cool things I did later.”

That made Chara stop, but he didn’t turn around. “You should try not to talk so much, Asriel.” He said, and I was taken aback. It was then that he turned and ran past me, flashing a sly smile my way. “Otherwise you’re gonna eat my dirt!” He added as he was already disappearing around a bend. I grinned myself and was soon speeding after him.

Chara was still faster than me, so I wasn’t surprised to find that had disappeared down one of the many branching passages that led to the outside of the dome. In my search, I found myself in a miniature gallery. Statues rendered in marble depicting times of peace and prosperity on the surface stood well over five times my height. Crystals embedded in the ceiling refracted light in such a way that the room was cast in a perpetual sunset. At the far end of the circular room was a statue of my grandfather, standing stoically over me and rendered in almost lifelike detail. When it began to speak I jumped back.

“Well, well. If it isn’t the prince of monsters.” I realized a second later that it was Chara’s voice echoing through the room. I looked around, trying to figure out where he was hiding. “Beloved of the people, befriender of humans, Asriel Dreemurr! He has risen to meet every challenge set before him with courage, but the greatest challenge of them all still lies before him. Tell me, prince, do you have the courage to face me?”

This was a new one for Chara, but I liked where it was going. “Why don’t you show yourself and find out?” I challenged.

“Ah, but this is no arena fit for our battle!” Chara’s voice was suddenly behind me. He was standing in the doorway, partially shadowed from the light in the hall. His eyes seemed to glow in that shadow. “We must ascend,” he finished. And with that, he was running off again. I chuckled to myself before following. He was really getting into this. Must have been where we were. Now that I think back on it, that place did have the feeling of being meant for some epic battle yet to come.

I ran to the nearest set stairs and took them as fast as I could up to the very top, knowing that was precisely where Chara would be waiting for me. By the time I reached the end I was breathing heavy, but I didn’t let that stop me. The doorway at the top of the stairs opened to the flat part of the roof that surrounded the dome of the main theater. I spared a moment to look out over the city. I could spend all day up there just watching monsters go about their lives. I still do, sometimes. Chara’s voice tore me away from the ledge.

“And finally he arrives.” He said behind me. I turned to face him, slipping back into character as I did.

“Of course,” I said, taking on a cocky air. “This has been a long time coming between you and me. At last, we will see who is just and who will submit.” It was how all our games of pretend went. Neither of us was ever the villain, always two heroes with different ideals, different thoughts on how things should be done. We would fight and one of us would lose and the other would always end up taking the loser as an adviser to help decide the future of our imaginary kingdom. It never got old.

I charged at my brother, raising a battle cry over the din of our invisible armies clashing together somewhere far below us on a battlefield neither of us had ever really seen. We had no branches or sticks to fight with, but we acted like we did anyway. I raised my imaginary sword over my head as Chara raised his to block. He followed through, pushing my weapon to the side and I spun into another strike. Coming up from below, Chara stepped aside my swing and tried to catch me with one of his own. I quickly spun my sword downward to block his counter attack and after a moment of dead lock we both jumped back from each other. Smiling at each other, we charged back in simultaneously, trading blow after blow. The sounds of clashing steel ringing from our mouths.

In our minds we were gods of the battlefield, trained for centuries and skilled to the point where we could defeat whole armies without a single person getting hurt. I never had any desire to become a warrior like my father, but sparing with Chara was always enjoyable.

As our battle raged on, we could both tell that neither of us would give this time around. And so we both dropped our nonexistent weapons and fell in on one another with bare hands, trying to wrestle the other to the ground. One of us tripped, I’m not sure who, and we both fell to the ground laughing, our limbs a tangled mess around each other. I lived for moments like that, where happiness seemed to melt the world around me. Where the only things that existed were me and Chara and that was all that mattered. Eventually, our laughter sputtered out and we untangled ourselves from each other. We stood up and walked over to the edge of the building together. We looked out over the city as if we had built it with our own hands and that everything was as it was because of us. “I’m thirsty.” Chara said absently and I smiled.

“I have just the solution for that.”

The assembly was not the only reason monsters had come to the amphitheater that day. Monsters love to make a big event out of almost anything, so in the streets surrounding the dome there were stands upon stands selling food and toys and other specialized magical creations. There was one such stand, just outside of the theater, that was my favorite. They came from Snowdin and sold all sorts of drinks and ice cream. And as I dragged Chara down several flights of stairs to the ground floor, my excitement only grew.

“Oh my, would you look at that! The prince of monsters graces me with his presence.” The old rabbit behind the stand said as we walked up to him. “And he has a friend with him! My, my, isn’t this a sight to behold.”

I smiled up at the old monster as Chara tried to hide behind me again, but I pulled him to my side. “This is Chara. And I thought I told you not to call me that, Mr. Nolan.”

The old monster chuckled. “Apologizes, my boy, sometimes I can’t help myself. So Chara was it?” He addressed Chara. “What can I do for you this fine afternoon?”

“We’ll take two cups of juice, please.” I said before Chara could break free and hide behind me again.

“Coming right up!” The monster said, slapping the counter. He went over to a barrel, grabbed two cups from beneath it. Filling them to the brim, he slid a straw into each and plopped them down before us. I thanked the monster while I grabbed the cups and gave Chara the money to pay him and we ran off to enjoy our treat.

“Is it true, what mom said?” Chara asked as we sat down in a corner.

“About what?” I asked, though I already knew. I hated talking about this.

“About you.”

I sighed and flicked the straw in my juice before saying, “Yes, especially as a Boss Monster. Normally, due to Boss Monsters being stronger in magic, our bodies are stronger as well. But not in my case; I’m barely as strong with magic as a normal monster.”

“But we play together all the time and you’re always fine.” Chara argued. I gave him a sideways look and he recoiled slightly. “Okay, almost always. But those were all accidents and they can be avoided as long as we’re not dumb. Just tell her you’ll be fine.”

“I’ve tried, she doesn’t listen.”

“Well, you still have me, then. You’ll always have me. Maybe that can be enough?”

I turned to my brother. “Don’t you want to make more friends too?” I asked him.

Chara said nothing for a moment, looking into his own cup. “I have you. That’s all I’ll ever need.”

“Well, I think we both need more friends.”

Chara shot up all of the sudden and took my hand. “Alright, all we have to do is prove it to her then.” He started pulling me away from the corner. “Come on, I have an idea. If we sneak away and go play with some monsters, mom will see that you’re just fine.”

“I don’t think that’s how it works at all. I just think that will make her mad at us…” I protested even as I was letting Chara pull me to my feet.

“Trust me, it’ll work. And then we’ll be able to play with everyone in the city.”

 

I’d like to say that we managed to sneak out of the amphitheater, but when you’re the prince of monsters, you tend to be pretty conspicuous. We were stopped by nearly every monster that saw us and were not able to get around many unseen. Most were satisfied by the story that we were sent on an errand by my mom when they asked what I was doing there without them. The rest were held at bay by the suggestion that I was helping Chara find their way home and a promise that I would be back soon.

The crowd was not very thick as we made it through the marketplace and back into the city, which meant that the meeting had not let out yet, thankfully. We didn’t have to go far to find a group playing in one of the courtyards. However, it was being watched over by a group of parents as well, and they simply told me that I should be with my parents before gathering everyone going off elsewhere.

We would have to get creative, it seemed. We abandoned the main streets, turning down alleys and side streets in search of anyone looking to add a couple more members to even out a team, or something similar. We had little luck though; we seemed to be unable to come across anyone at all. I tugged on Chara’s shirt after some time as he led us down yet another side street. “Maybe we should start heading back,” I suggested. “We’ve been gone a while now.”

Chara stopped for a moment shook his head. “This was your idea, Asriel. I don’t want you to go back disappointed.”

A thought occurred to me. “You’re not just doing this for me, are you?” I asked my brother. But I never got an answer.

“There!” he said as he peaked around a corner. Looking around him, I saw that there was a group of monsters all kicking a ball back and forth between them. There were five in all, two Migosps, and there a yellow lizard with a row of spikes descending down from the top of its head to the tip of its tail. The other two I recognized, it was the Loox and Whimsun pair I had tried to make plans with just a little while ago. More importantly, there were no parents. “Well, there they are. Do you still want to do this?” Chara asked me.

“I guess so…” I answered, barely above a mumble.

Chara stepped around the corner without hesitation, pulling me along with him. “What should we do?” He asked.

“Just ask them nicely.” I suggested.

“Hey! Let us play with you.” Chara demanded, shouting over to them.

“That’s not asking…” I grumbled. “Here, let me.” I addressed the group. They had all stopped kicking around the ball and were staring at us now. To my surprise, none of them seemed to recognize me. “Hi, we saw that you guys were playing and were wondering if my brother and I could join you.”

They all glanced at each other before the lizard answered for the group. “Sure. The more the merrier.” We walked closer and the group began to look us over.

“You sure look weird.” One of the Migosps said to Chara as he got a little too close to him. “What kind of monster are you?”

“This is Chara.” I answered quickly. “He’s the only one I’ve met like him.” The answer seemed to satisfy and the monster backed off with a nod.

“And you look a lot like the king and queen.” The lizard monster said to me. “I bet that must suck.”

“Yeah, I get that a lot.” I said as I awkwardly scratched the back of my head. Going along with the misconception would probably be easier. Less of a chance they’d run away for fear of getting in trouble with their parents.

“So what’s your guys’ story?” The lizard monster asked once we were all back in a circle and kicking the ball around.

“Just bored.” Chara answered before I could come up with anything as an answer. “So we thought we’d look around for some fun.” He sounded happy, a lot happier than I would have guessed.

“You from here or did you come with your parents for the meeting?” One of the Migosps asked after.

“Does it matter?” Chara asked back sounding mildly annoyed.

“Chara…” I started.

“No, you’re right. It doesn’t really matter, since most likely we’ll never see you two goofballs again.” The lizard went on and the rest of the group laughed. I chuckled nervously along with them. Chara’s look reminded me of the first time I found him in the catacombs, that look of wanting to run away yet ready to fight for his life at the same time, which had me worried a little.

When the group’s laughter died out, they all seemed to realize my brother wasn’t laughing with them and it became very quiet. The Loox had the ball and it kicked it to me. I was too busy waiting to see if something bad was about to happen to see it roll past me until it was already half way down the alley.

“Wow, kid,” the lizard monster commented. Apparently he had seen it, “you have the reflexes of a monster that had fallen down. You couldn’t have even stopped it from rolling away with magic? What’s wrong with you? At least go get it.”

I had taken two steps, mumbling an apology under my breath before Chara spoke up. “Hey! Don’t talk to him like that.” I turned to see my brother in the lizard monster’s face. The monster had his arms up as if to say that he means no harm.

“Whoa, calm down buddy. I was just ragging on him. I didn’t mean anything by it.”

“Just because you didn’t ‘mean anything by it,’ doesn’t mean that words don’t hurt.” My brother had grabbed the monster by the collar of his yellow and brown stripped shirt. He looked ready to explode.

“Chara!” I shouted and he let go of the monster immediately as if finally realizing what he was doing. The monster backed away, thankfully not doing anything to escalate the matter further.

I watched his face go from anger to shock to puzzlement and then back to anger before he walked over to me and whispered. “They shouldn’t talk to you like that.” He told me. “It isn’t right.”

I tried to give him a reassuring smile, but I don’t think it worked. The look on Chara’s face still made me feel nervous. It was a different kind of fierceness now, sharper. Much different than the look where he thought he needed to defend himself. “It’s fine Chara.” I told him. “He was just joking.”

My brother’s frown only deepened. “Jokes like that aren’t funny.”

“Well, they’re not a reason to threaten people either.” I said. I was becoming a little frustrated myself at that point. Why did he care about this so much?

Finally he seemed to realize he was in the wrong. He dropped his eyes and said. “You’re right. I’m sorry Asriel.”

“Asriel?” I heard one of the other monsters echo. “You _are_ the prince, aren’t you? Oh, crud.” Apparently my brother had not been quiet enough. All of the monsters were looking at us now, more fear in their eyes than when Chara had grabbed their friend. “Quick let’s get out of here before our parents find out!”

“No wait!” I pleaded, pushing part my brother. “I just wanted to play. I promise you won’t get in trouble.” The group was on the verge of booking it, but they stopped and looked at each other. I should have realized then and there that something was wrong when I saw the looks that passed between them.

“Alright you’re forgiven.” The lizard monster said as he walked up to me and my brother. He seemed to be weighing us once again and he had a sly smile on his face. All of his wariness towards Chara was gone. “But now you owe us one, and here’s how you can make it up to us.” The other monsters formed a circle around the three of us, arms over chest for those who could manage it and on hips for those who could not. “We’re taking quite the risk hanging out with you, if you weren’t aware. Pretty much every parent in the Underground has said you’re off limits even to talk to.” I had known as much already, but it still hurt to hear. “So, there’s this one thing we’ve wanted to do for a while, but we never had enough monsters to do it. With you two, though, it shouldn’t be a problem. What do you say?”

“I say it looks like we don’t have a choice.” Chara said before I could do anything again. He was making it very hard for me to smooth things over before they could get worse.

The monster nodded. “You’re half right. Well?”

“Deal,” I said before anyone else could chime in. The monster’s smirk grew.

“Good.” He gestured with his head for us to follow. The circle of monsters broke around us and they were running after the lizard as he sprinted down the alley, and Chara and I found ourselves swept up in it as well.

We followed the monsters down several alleys. Every now and then Chara would shoot me looks that mirrored my own thoughts: _what the heck was I thinking?_ Finally we came to the mouth of an intersection with a main road. We were in the market district, I realized. The street was lined with stalls occupied by shouting monsters. I only recognized some of them today. The Whimsun, buzzing between our heads, pointed at one of the stalls and said, “That one, right?”

We followed its finger to a stand selling fruit. The lizard monster nodded. “That’s the one.” He turned to us. “Your job’s easy, just distract the vendor and we’ll do the rest.” He said no more as the group vanished into the crowd filling the street. I had lost all of them within seconds. I looked back at the vendor for a moment before shrugging and heading out in the street myself. What’s the harm in striking up a conversation?

Chara pulled me back. “They want us to help steal for them.” He informed me and my eyes went wide.

“Chara, we really need to talk about your habit of assuming the worst of people.” My brother only shook his head in response and began point out into the street. He had managed to pick out every one of the group, hiding around corners. All of them were waiting, and watching both the two of them and the stall in turn. I realized he was right.

Monsters may be creatures that are good natured by design, but to suggest that we didn’t have at least a few bad eggs would be a misrepresentation. We have our trouble makers, our hooligans; monsters that somehow came to be without that characteristic selflessness we’re associated with. And, unfortunately, this seemed to be a whole group of them.

Members of the group were already walking back towards us. They didn’t look happy. “What’s the hold up?” The lizard asked, practically shoving himself into me. “We can’t start until you guys go.”

“We’re not doing it.” Chara told him.

I looked to my brother and then to the monster, trying to show a measure of Chara’s resolve. “We’re not going to help you steal.” I agreed.

The monster’s brow furrowed more than it already had. The two Migosps had followed behind him and were blocking off the alley. “Listen, shrimp,” the lizard went on, “we’re not stealing. We have permission from the prince to take anything we’d like. Isn’t that right? Besides, I don’t really think you’re in a position to say no.”

As scared as I was, I would not let myself be pushed around by this monster, not in front of Chara. I looked the monster straight in the eye and told it, “The only permission you have from me is to get out of my way.” I was proud of the comeback; the other monster was not impressed. The next thing I knew I was on the ground with pain shooting through my chest and as I was picking myself up I saw that Chara had the lizard by the throat up against the wall.

“Don’t touch Asriel.” He said in low growl. A soft red light appeared between my brother and the monster. I knew what it was immediately.

Apparently so did the monster. “Holy crap, you’re a human!” He managed through the grip on his neck.

“Chara!” I shouted. My brother let go of the monster immediately, coming to his senses. It was already too late, though. The other monsters had heard their friend and were already off running. After being released, the lizard slunk away as well while I grabbed my brother’s arm. He was panting. No, he was hyperventilating. I grabbed his other arm as well. “Chara, are you okay?” My brother said nothing. He was staring through me. I could hear shouts coming from the street already. “Chara, we have to go.” I told him. He still didn’t move. “Chara, come on!”

I pulled my brother by the arms. Whether finally pulled out of his world or merely following on instinct, he allowed himself to be guided through the alleys. I had no idea where to go though, or where I was going. The whole city would be out for blood in a few minutes if word of a human spread. All I knew is that we couldn’t stay there.

I ran aimlessly at first, ruling out places to hide, avoiding the main streets; at some point I had realized that going back to my parents would be the best option. They could explain everything so that no one would attack Chara. They definitely would not be happy about any of what happened though…

By the time I had decided to go back to the meeting, I realized I had absolutely no idea where I was. I looked up. Somewhere near the edge of the dome by the looks of it, but I had no idea which part. The shouts had not disappeared from hearing yet. Someone was still close and most definitely looking for us.

There was only one other option then: hide. I pulled Chara into the nearest building, thankfully abandoned. We hid in the back corner rooms of one of the upper floors. It used to be a bed room, some forgotten centuries ago. Only the remnants of furniture remained when we found it, however, just what had been carved out of the stone with the rest of the building.

Chara sat down in the corner almost as soon as we entered, hands around his knees and tucked in close as the hush took him, as I knew it would the moment we stopped. It would be awhile before I could get him to move again, though I was certainly in no rush to leave. I used the time to look around. The building was empty, for the most part. More than anything, I would poke my head out a window and listen if anyone had come closer. They still sounded relatively far off. It didn’t seem like they had made it to searching anywhere near the build yet though. I knew it was only a matter of time until they did, though. They would scour the whole city until the human was found dead or alive. I wondered if mom or dad had already gotten word of what was going on as I went back to the room I had left Chara in. I wondered if they had ended the meeting early just to deal with the crisis I was certain was happening out there; the crisis I had caused.

I sat down next to my brother and held out my hand for when he was ready, letting my mind drift over whether he would come back before or after we were found; whether it would be just any monster, one of the city guard, or my parents who found us.

Not sure how much later, Chara finally took my hand. I looked over to him to see he was looking at me. I tried to give him a reassuring smile. His eyes were even redder than they normally were; he had been crying silently for hours. I wish I knew how I could prevent him from getting like that. “They’re hunting us.” It wasn’t a question, but I nodded anyway. “They’re hunting me.” I nodded again, much more reluctantly. “I’m sorry…” He said, letting go of my hand to hug his knees again. He stared at the wall instead of the floor this time, so I knew he was still with me.

“No, I’m sorry. I wanted this. We should have just stayed at the meeting.” It was then that I let my frustration out. I stood up and began to pace back and forth through the room. “This isn’t fair!” I shouted. “It’s been almost a thousand years since any monster had seen a human. Why is everyone supposed to assume you’re going to hurt them and that you should be captured?”

“No, they’re right. Humans, they’re all horrible.” Chara said into his knees. He looked ready to cry again. “I hate humans. I hate that I am one. I’m sick of being me; I wish I were someone else.”

“Chara…” I leaned down in front of my brother just as I heard a noise come from the doorway. I turned, blocking Chara, only to be met with nothing. Fire sprung to life in my hands, though it would only be affective as a deterrent at best if I actually had to use it.

I walked slowly to the doorway and stuck my head out. Two figures stood pressed against the wall. I recognized them: they were the Migosps from before. They held up their arms as an expression of peace. “We’re not here to capture you.” One of them said. “We just want to help you escape,” said the other. “They’re almost to this building. We went ahead to try and see if we could find you first.”

“Why should I believe you?” I was surprised by how fierce my voice sounded. It did the trick though; the pair stepped back in fright.

“We don’t like what our friends were doing any more than you do.”

“We were just going along with it because we didn’t know what else to do. But you stopped them, so we want to help.” The other added.

I let the fire in my hand go out. “Alright, meet us down stairs. We’ll be down in a minute.”

“Hurry.” One of them said before doing as told.

I went back into the room to see that Chara hadn’t moved. He looked at me when I went up to him at least. “Come on, we’re getting out of here.” I told him. “Some of the monsters from before want to help us.”

Chara grabbed my arm. “No. We should stay here.” He said. “I don’t trust them. We should wait for mom or your dad.”

I sighed. “Chara, they want to help. There’s no guarantee that mom or dad will find us first anyway. They’re trying to be good friends.”

“They’re not acting good friends. They’re not acting like friends at all.” Chara practically growled. “Nice people don’t make fun of you; they don’t try to take advantage of you. You taught me that, Asriel. They’re nice all of the time. Not just when they think it will help them.”

I started to pick up noises from outside. “Well, either way, we need to move.” I told him. “And I’d rather follow them than wander around lost again.”

Chara growled in truth in response to that, but at least he stood up. We met the Migosps on ground floor. They were watching out the door in the front. “Alright?” I said to get they’re attention. “Lead on.”

The pair of monsters led us through several allies without hesitation. One would check ahead to see if anyone was coming and then would signal us forward or to turn a different way without the rest of us needing to stop. “We should head to the amphitheater.” I told them at one point. “My parents are there and they can put an end to all of this.” They nodded in understanding, but said nothing. Their direction didn’t seem to change either.

Chara, if somehow you’re reading this, know that I wish I had listened to you that day. About everything. In hindsight, it seems like all of my problems could have been avoided by listening to you.

Well… maybe not all of them…

The pair of Migosps were leading us further out of the city I realized once the buildings started to thin. Then, suddenly, we stopped in the middle of a collapsed street. The buildings all around us were piles of rubble where they hadn’t simply fallen into a giant fissure in the stone that split the street in two. I had never been to that part of the city before. I don’t think anyone had been for a long time.

“Where are we?” Chara asked, echoing my own thoughts.

“Right where we want you to be, human,” a familiar voice answered.

The rest of the group from before appeared out of the shadows. Sly grins marked their faces. In my shock, one of the Migosps grabbed me from behind. The monster pulled my arm up my back to the point where I thought it might tear off. The other had grabbed Chara, who was putting up much more of a struggle than me.

The lizard walked up to Chara and got as close as he dared, before saying. “We can’t just have you running around free, now can we? Whether or not you are with the prince, you’re still just a filthy human.” The monster head-butted my brother square in the forehead. I screamed and the monster laughed. I watched my brother’s struggles falter as mine renewed. I tried my best to kick and punch my way from my captor but it was no use.

“Hey, what should we do about him?” The Migosp holding me shouted. “He’s getting slippery.”

The lizard turned his attention to me, I saw now that his smile did not touch his eyes. They were filled with a rage I was not aware monsters were capable of possessing at the time. I’ve since learned better.

“It would be a shame if the young prince were to perish at the hands of the rogue human, but after today’s events I think it might be something I can live with. It will make quite the story at least.”

“You can’t be serious!” The Migosp holding me said.

The lizard grabbed me by the shirt, pulling me away from the other monster and towards the edge of the fissure. “Dead.” He said looking me straight in the eye.

Monsters aren’t good at being angry. We can be annoyed, frustrated, but it is very, very hard to get us well and truly angry. One thing that never seemed to fail to do it though, is humans. The ancient betrayals they committed against us must have left some sort of scar deep enough on us to make us capable of such hate. And it changes us; make us mad in a completely different way. So, to a certain extent, I wasn’t surprised when the monster holding me pushed me off of the edge of the fissure. One moment, I was staring into the kid’s sneering face, and the next the world was upside down. The rock quickly shrouded me in darkness and I was not surprised. But I did question it. I questioned it to the point where I’d lost hope, not hope that I’d make it out of that alive – the thought didn’t even cross my mind, to be honest – but hope that I’d ever be able to get monsters to stop hating humans.

What did surprise me was the red light that flashed at the top of the ravine as my body flipped back to a direction where I could see it. And just after I saw a figure jump into the middle of that crack of light. It was Chara; I could see his soul glowing in his chest brighter than I ever remember seeing it before that point. I could see him reaching out towards me and then the red light shot out towards me in a line that wrapped itself around my body before disappearing into thin air.

Chara spun out of my view just before I was jerked to stillness. I swung slowly back and forth in my invisible bonds. It was strange, I floated in midair yet I felt nothing pulling at me and my arms were not restricted though I just watched them get wrapped up. Then I realized what Chara had done: bonding magic.

I looked up at my savior, still swinging back and forth slightly. Chara was standing sideways against the side of the cliff. His arms were outstretched like he was holding some invisible rope, probably not realizing it was unnecessary with the type of magic he just used. If he was afraid by the fact that he was practically floating, or that he was holding me over a seemingly endless drop, he didn’t show it. Instead, he smiled. “Good catch, huh?” He said, jokingly.

Still in shock, I nodded. “Uh huh.” I said weakly.

Then, he looked sad. I even thought I felt a tear hit my head. “I… I’m sorry, Asriel. I hurt them… I couldn’t help it. I had to do something.”

“It’s okay, Chara. You were just trying to protect us. I forgive you.”

He wiped his nose. “I don’t think I can pull us up.” He added. And then I laughed.

Then, a giant hand reached over the edge of the ravine and seemed to pluck Chara from the air and I found myself being dragged up with him. I was scared up until I put my feet on the ground and saw that the one that pulled us up was my dad. His face changed expression at mile a minute between anger relief, joy and a thousand other things. I didn’t care what would happen after that moment. I was just happy to see him. I wrapped my arm around his leg as I felt tears start to well up in my eyes. My mom was there a moment later and I flew into her arms. Chara did as well.

We were not the only ones there, I realized. Murmuring voices revealed the crowd that filled the dilapidated street. Occasionally one voice or another could be heard over the rest. “It really is a human,” I heard. “It hurt those poor kids and almost killed the price too.”

I looked over to where we had almost been captured. All of the kids were all lying on the ground surrounded by other monsters that seemed to be healing them. “It’s okay, the king is here now. He can kill the human.” Then, the whole crowd seemed to echo that statement. “Kill the human.”

I felt crushed; I felt stupid. How could I have hoped monsters would ever accept Chara? Or any human for that matter. They jumped to the wrong conclusion in a matter of moments and questioned none of it. Monsters weren’t like that. What was this hate turning us into?”

I looked to my father; he was staring out over the crack in the earth. I couldn’t read his face. The cries for Chara’s death at his hands were getting louder. Finally, he turned.

“Enough!” He shouted. His deep voice carried throughout the street with ease. The crowd went silent. “I saw everything.” He told them. “This boy did not hurt these children without cause, and he did not try to kill my son, he saved him.”

He gestured to the group still on the ground. “These children tried to capture the both of them. They tried to kill my son and blame it on the human. For what reason, I do not know…” My dad didn’t like to think any monster capable of such a thing. “This human has been living with my family for some time now. He has been like a son to us. In fact,” My dad walked over to Chara and put a hand on his shoulder. Chara looked slightly scared and the gesture. “From this day forth, he is my son.” He smiled down at my brother and Chara actually seemed to smile back.

My dad turned back to the crowd. “The humans of old who sealed us in the mountain are long gone. And I am beginning to think our ancient animosities against them should be shed as well. As we move forward from here on, this human and any others who may find themselves trapped down here will be treated as one of our own. We are monsters. We are peaceful creatures. It is time we started acting like it.”

To my surprise, the crowd actually cheered. My mom grabbed us tighter and then let us go when my father walked back over to us. He suddenly looked serious. They both did. My dad got to his knees and took in both me and Chara. “We will discuss this day’s antics later. For now, Chara, I apologize for how I have treated you up to this point. It was unfair of me to express any of my old anger towards you.” He rubbed a hand through Chara’s hair. “You are a fine child, and I would be honored if you would be a part our family in earnest.” My brother, my true brother from that moment on, practically leaped into my father’s arms and I followed soon after. Our mom joined us as well and we laughed and smiled as a family for the first time.

I never saw my parents fight again after that day.


	4. The First Announcement

Bonding magic: a type of magic that, in essence, links objects together. It’s the foundation of thing like telekinesis, and tying off spells or it is, more accurately, their predecessors. The spell works by linking properties of objects together more so than the objects themselves, though in its simplest uses that is the effect obtained. An example of it being used in that basic form is how Chara saved me from falling down that crevice, by ‘physically’ tying the spell around me and linking us together.

It is by far not the only thing that can be done with that type of magic. For example, one could bond two rocks together by their weight, one large and one small, and give the smaller rock the larger weight in order to make it unmovable or give the larger rock the smaller weight to make it easier to move. One could bond an object’s position based on that of another object so that it moved relative to the other object. You could even manipulate the relationships between the objects so that let’s say you tied two objects positions together and moved one object a foot the other would move two or three or however many you wanted, in theory.

There was so much magic like this could do, according to the books I read because I was honestly even more curious about it than Chara was. Most of it had a lot more to do with math to get the desired results than I thought it would, and I couldn’t make heads or tails of much of that stuff. There were even parts about being able to link changes in property to changes in another property, but that had more math than any accompanying it and a big warning that said you should not try it unless you knew what you were doing. But, in short, bonding magic is as said: magic that bonds things; makes them one. It’s strange that my brother, who had trouble connecting with anyone, would resonate with such magic.

To this day, it is the one thing that truly scared me about my brother. Because of the fact that it worked on more than just inanimate objects. And if you made yourself part of the tie it would give you a measure of control over the other. Sometimes that fact makes me think.

The troubles of that day in the city were soon forgotten. After quite a hefty lecture from my mother and just a few curt words from dad about what we did wrong and why we would never, ever do it again, we settled in for the night, but got very little sleep. Chara was a tirade of questions about what he had done in that fissure with magic. Though, at the time I knew very little about it myself, hence the research. I told him what I could from the books we had on hand as I read them – Chara wasn’t a very good reader himself – and he seemed to drink it in. Everything else seemed out of his mind at that time, and I was perfectly okay with keeping it like that.

If my parents had been unaware of Chara’s newfound power at first, they were certainly aware of it the next morning. Our home quickly became a vortex of chaos as everything started behaving unlike they should. Furniture would move whenever mom picked up a book, plates would follow dad from room to room. Jars of spices would stay rooted to shelves. My brother and I couldn’t stop laughing. Our parents weren’t so amused.

Ordered to play outside while they cleaned up, I remember catching my father saying, almost absently, “Our children seem to have outgrown this house. Perhaps it is time to move.”

That thought kept surfacing in my head as Chara and I played around the tree in the yard. I couldn’t stop thinking about what it would be like, leaving and never coming back again. I loved it there; I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else. And as I caught myself looking down the tunnel towards the catacombs and Home, I realized it wasn’t the house I shared with my family I was thinking about, but the Underground as a whole.

“What’s wrong?” Chara asked from the tree. He was standing perfectly sideways on the trunk without needing to hold on to any branches. I continued to stare off, thinking of the future.

“Do you like it here?” I asked him finally.

He tilted his head. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, do you like it here, with us, in this house, under this mountain?”

Chara stepped off and sat down beneath the branches. “Of course.”

I turned my gaze to my brother. He was looking at me with that smile that did not touch his eyes. “Would you call it home?” I asked him.

My brother was the one to look away at that, but he did not hesitate before answering. “It’s the only home I’ve ever had.”

I sat down by the tree as well, sitting across from Chara. “And what if we were somewhere else? Would that be able to become home, or would home always be here?”

My brother seemed amused by the question, as if he had answered it a thousand times before. “I don’t care where I am, Asriel, as long as we’re together.” And that’s what settled it for me, in the end. When the news finally became official over dinner a few days later that we were moving to New Home, I was nothing if not excited.

We decided to make a big trip out of our first visit to tell everyone in between the two cities that would not be able to make it to the main announcement personally. Heading into the city in the early hours of morning, we walked its edge to the tunnel that connected Home to the rest of the Underground. Back in those days, it wasn’t connected to underneath our house. My mom and dad were both dressed in their formal robes and my mom carried a bag of things we would need for the trip like food and extra clothes. I could tell Chara was nervous going to some place new. I told him what to expect, but for some reason that didn’t help matters.

I had only been to Snowdin a couple of times myself at that point, and I always found it a wonder. The dense winter forest held a wealth of mystery to be explored and I had always wanted to go there with Chara to play, but my mom would have none of that.

Chara didn’t seem to like the cold all that much. Two thick shirts and gloves seemed to make little difference for humans and did not stop him from shaking whenever he stood still and his teeth from rattling no matter what he did.

When we came to the town that was tucked up on the cliff just before the entrance deeper into the Underground it was much bigger than I remember, going from just a few houses to several streets worth of buildings.

Monsters moved to and fro through the street that spilt the town down the middle, going about their morning business. They were all of the fur-covered variety, as they had been the last time I was there, the reason for why was becoming more and more apparent as I looked over at my brother. Something was dripping out of his nose now. The human body does some weird things.

Most monsters stopped and stared at us as we went by, stepping to the side to give us a wide berth. I recognized one or two of them from the meetings who had friendly if not equally shocked expressions, but most I did not know at all. Chara was trying his best to hide behind me once more and any effort to try to push him in front of me was met with a stone’s resistance.

We walked to the center of town, a large empty square between two intersecting streets, snow well packed from travel. When we reached it, I noticed that some monsters had followed us and a crowd was already beginning to form. My parents were scanning over the crowd much the same as I was, and when they were done they looked to each other and nodded. My mom knelt down to us and said, “I bet you two are cold. Why don’t we go somewhere and warm up until everything is done here?”

Personally, I did not want to miss anything, but Chara seemed eager enough at the sound of warmth that I nodded my assent. My mom took each of us by a hand and led us a little ways back down the street we came from to a restaurant with a big sign on the front that said “Grillby’s”.

Stepping inside, I heard Chara almost immediately breathe a sigh of relief. It was definitely far warmer than it was outside, and as I looked around the room I found why. Behind a bar, past several rows of empty tables, the only other occupant in the room was a monster made entirely out of living flame. I found his presence there odd. Why would a monster like him be in Snowdin of all places? Well, to each their own, I guessed.

My mom went up to the monster. He gave the best bow he could from behind the bar, but he said nothing. “I hate to ask you this,” she began, “but would you mind watching my children for a few moments? They should not be much trouble. They are very well mannered.” She turned her head to us. “Usually.”

The monster nodded his agreement and my mom plopped us down at one of the tables and pulled the bag she had off of her shoulder. She placed several sheets of paper and crayons on the table before smiling down at us. “Now you both behave for Mr. Grillby, all right? We should not be long, but in case you get bored you will have something to do.”

That certainly wouldn’t do. I didn’t agree to this trip to be shoved inside for most of it. “But I don’t want to miss the announcement.” I argued.

“You are not going to miss all of it,” my mom assured me, “just the boring parts where we work out all the little details. I will come get you when it is time for the rest.”

“Can we at least go out and explore?” I tried instead. “It’s too hot in here.” Out of the corner of my eye I saw Chara’s head shoot up and I could feel the look he was giving me to shut up. My mom shook her head anyway.

“Absolutely not,” she said firmly. “I do not need you two getting lost here of all places. Now please, stay here so I can come get you when we are done.” That was the end of it, unfortunately. That day in the city was still fresh in their minds, even if they never directly brought it up. They did not want us going anywhere without them now. My mom walked to the door and wrapped her scarf back around her before stepping out.

I sighed and turned to the paper and crayons on the table. Picking them up I began to waste the morning away. I was midway through a drawing of my family in our future home when I realized Chara was not sitting across from me anymore. Searching, I found that he was hiding behind one of the stools at the bar. He was staring at Grillby from the other side of the bar like he was trying to read something through running water. I went over and tapped him on the shoulder. He jumped hard enough to hit his head on the underside of the wood. “Sorry…” I mumbled as he turned to glare at me, rubbing his head.

Grillby took notice of us after that. He put down the glass that he was cleaning and walked over to look down at each of us in turn. He gestured for us to sit without a word. I helped Chara onto one of the stools before he pulled me up onto the one next to him. We both looked up at the fire monster, unsure of what was about to happen. Deftly, the monster pulled out two glasses from beneath the bar and spun them onto the table in front of us. Then, he reached behind him a grabbed a bottle off of the shelves mounted on the back wall. He threw it into the air and caught it in front of him with one hand. With the other he scooped up one of the glasses and held it below the bottle as he tilted it downward. A dark liquid was poured a good two feet into the glass that Grillby placed back on the bar once it was full without spilling a drop. He then picked up the other glass and did the same.

He placed the bottle back on the shelves and leaned on the bar, looking between us. I wasn’t sure if I should clap or not. After a moment of still silence, he gestured for us to take the glasses. I hesitated, unsure if it was something we should actually be drinking. Bubbles were beginning to form at the rim of the glass which did not help me think it was. Chara reached his glass first. He took a sip and smiled. “It’s root beer!” he exclaimed excitedly. The fire monster nodded in confirmation.

“What’s root beer?” I asked, reaching out to my own drink finally.

“It’s soda.” My brother said as if it were obvious.

“What’s soda?” I held the cup close to my nose to sniff it, but some of it seemed to jump out and hit me in the face as I did. I pulled the glass away from me in shock.

“Just try it.” Chara told me.

I brought the cup closer once more. Trying to ignore what was getting on my nose, I took a sip. It was sweeter than juice and had the taste of molasses. I almost drank the whole glass in one go. It was delicious.

“Wow.” I started, putting the glass back on the counter. “That was really…” I stopped as I felt a pressure begin to build in my chest. I was about to tell Chara that I felt weird when the pressure suddenly moved up and air escaped from my mouth with a strange noise that I couldn’t control. I practically screamed after it was over with what little air I had left in me.

Chara almost fell off of his stool in laughter. He kicked and slammed his hand down on the wood as I just sat there unsure as to whether or not I was dying. When he finally got control of himself, the look on my face sent him into another bout. “Nice one.” He told me through his shaking voice.

“What was that?” Chara either did not realize how scared I was or did not care.

“It was a burp.” He told me. “It happens when you drink soda.” That did not help my fear; the name sounded like some sort of deadly disease I had contracted. “Watch.” Chara said before hitting himself in the chest and making a noise similar to the one I had made. “It’s the bubbles.” He said in answer to my next question.

“I don’t think I like soda anymore…” I told him, and he laughed once more.

“Having fun you two?” My mom’s voice came from behind us. “You are not giving them anything they should not be having are you?” She said to Grillby who threw his hands up in denial of anything criminal. My mom giggled before turning back to us. “Come, it is time to say hello.”

Walking back into the frigid air, Chara began to shake almost immediately. My mom even gave him her scarf but it didn’t seem to help him much either. We were led back to the square; there was quite a large crowd around it now, I could hear my dad speaking somewhere in the center, but the mumbles of the monsters around him kept most of what he was saying from making much sense to me. Mom pulled us to the side and leaned down to Chara. “Now, in a moment all of these monsters are going to want to meet you, Chara. I know that crowds make you a bit uncomfortable, so if you do not want to say anything, that is fine. They have never seen a human before, you understand, and I am sure many of them are eager to.”

Chara nodded, though he seemed to want to say something more. My mom returned the gesture and made her way back into the crowd. When she disappeared I immediately tried to get closer for a better look, but the crowd was several monsters deep and I couldn’t see or hear any better. On my way back to Chara, I accidentally ran into someone.

“Someone is sure in a hurry.” The monster said with a chuckle as she grabbed me to stop me from falling over. “Oh, your highness. I’m sorry; I didn’t see it was you.”

I looked up at the monster that had caught me while I rubbed my now sore nose. She was a pink furred rabbit monster, cradling a small bundle in one arm. “No, I’m sorry.” I told her. “I wasn’t looking where I was going. And just Asriel is fine.”

Chara was at my side a moment later. “And who is this?” The monster said not unkindly. “Could this be the young human we’ve been hearing so much about from the king and queen?”

I nodded. “This is Chara.” I told her and she chuckled again.

The monster knelt down in the snow so that she could get a good look at my brother. “I hear you’re a hero. And I’d say you definitely look like one to me.” The monster smiled and rubbed Chara’s hair. Chara’s eyes were glued to the bundle in the monster’s arms. “Would you like to meet her?” she asked suddenly and I realized what the bundle was as she held it out to us. Wrapped in the cloth was a newborn baby, eyes closed to the world. Chara and I both could not help but stare. “Look, Sallie,” the monster said to the child. “It’s the prince, Asriel. One day he’ll be your king and you’ll be able to tell everyone ‘I knew the king while I was still just a baby.’”

She and I both laughed. Chara seemed hypnotized; he had even stopped shivering. “She’s beautiful.” He whispered. To his defense, he had never seen a baby monster before that moment. My brother was reaching out to the bundle. I don’t think he even realized it, because he jumped when the older rabbit told him, “Go ahead. You can hold her.”

Suddenly very hesitant, Chara held out his arms and took the bundle from the mother. He smiled down at the baby and, strangely enough, the glow of his soul suddenly grew through his shirts. The red light was enough to wake the baby as it fell over her face and she started to cry.

“Oh, it’s okay.” The mother said to the baby as she pulled her back to her arms. “Everything’s alright.”

Chara looked away nervously. “Sorry.” He mumbled.

“Oh, it’s not your fault, dear. I’m sure she just wanted to say hi too.”

“Boys?” I heard my mom call to us. “You can come here now.”

I turned to see that the crowd had parted around us so I could now see into the middle of the square. Eyes turned to us and I felt Chara duck behind me an instant later. This time, I didn’t mind or try to stop him. Everyone looked at us with a mixture of suspicion and fear. I swallowed and started to walk towards mom and dad. I could feel Chara trying to pull me back, but he didn’t put much force behind it. I thought I heard him whimper once or twice as well.

When I stood in front of my parents, I turned to face the crowd again. “Come on, Chara. No one is going to hurt you.” I whispered to him. That seemed enough to convince him, if ever so slowly. I held my brother’s hand as he moved to stand next to me. I did my best to smile encouragement, but his eyes were glued to the ground.

“Everyone, this is Chara.” My father said to those gathered around us. Every eye went to Chara and I saw their fear disappear as their suspicion grew. They began to whisper amongst each other.

“That’s it? That’s not so bad. I had expected something, well, evil.”

“It’s barely taller than the prince! Something like that can’t be that dangerous. I can’t believe I was even scared.”

“It’s actually kind of cute…”

“Are we sure it’s even human? Not that I doubt you, your majesties, but I’ve seen some monster’s that look pretty close to that. I mean, maybe it’s just another boss monster.” That last was directed at us. I looked up and my parents. I wasn’t sure what to do about that question. I had never expected people would not simply believe us.

My dad nodded to my mom and she leaned down to Chara again with the same warm smile as before. “Chara, would be so kind and lift up your shirt for me.” Of course, his soul; that was better proof than anything. I felt my brother squeeze my hand at the request.

“It’s okay, Chara,” I told him. “There’s nothing to be embarrassed about.” Chara seemed to understand what we wanted after that. He lifted up his shirt and the soft red glow of the soul in his chest shone true. The monsters in the crowd gasped; they had no doubts now, but thankfully their fear did not return. I saw Chara shiver, and not from the cold that time.

The crowd moved in closer. A thousand questions came at Chara all at once. What was the surface like? Why did you leave? How you come to be here? Do the humans remember them? What are other humans like? More and more they came, not even giving Chara a chance to answer one before ten more came his way. This time I jumped in front of Chara before it all became too much for him.

My parents managed to calm everyone down after a minute. “Now, now, I understand everyone is curious, but most of the matters of Chara’s origins are a bit… touchy.” My mom told everyone. “I’m sure we will all learn the answers to our questions in time.”

Most of the crowd began to disband as they realized they would not get anything more. My father finished addressing those that remained with more details of how things would change once we finished our move. Mom put a hand on each of our shoulders and gave us a smile that said we did a good job before pulling us back out of the square so they could finish up.

Sitting on the steps of one of the buildings in the street we waited for just that. Monsters watched us silently as they went past. I couldn’t tell what any of them were thinking. “I think that went okay.” I told Chara who was looking at the ground once more. He shook his head in response. “Oh, come on. You couldn’t really ask for more than that. At least they didn’t attack us.” I realized that wasn’t funny before I finished saying it. “Well, at least they seem to agree with what we’re doing.” Chara shook his head again. “What?” I asked, getting frustrated at his pessimism once again.

Chara stood up from the steps and pulled me along with him into a gap between two of the builds not too far away. “What are we doing?” I asked, but he just shushed me to silence. I waited a few minutes, standing there in the snow clueless as to what was going on. Chara stared out into the street. “Mom and Dad are gonna be mad if we’re not where-” he shushed me again.

Finally, my brother jumped and gestured for me to listen. I didn’t hear anything at first, but as it grew closer, I picked up on the conversation. “The idea of a human as part of the royal family? It’s ridiculous! They must not be in their right minds.”

“It’s as if they’d forgotten who trapped us down here in the first place. Do they seriously expect us to just put all of that behind us? Child or not, it’s still a human; a danger to us all, if you ask me.”

“Well there’s not much we can do about it, is there? The king and queen really seem to think of the human as their own child.”

“Nah, I’m sure this won’t last forever. Give it time. The human will slip, show its true colors, and everything will go back to normal.”

The monsters moved on. I was stunned. My knees gave out and I slid against the wall of the building into the snow. I had deluded myself into thinking that my parents support would be enough to convince everyone else. Of course it wouldn’t be that simple. I was an idiot to think that. Would monsters ever see the possibility of peace between them and humans? At that moment, I felt like giving up.

Chara tapped my shoulder. He looked down at me in understanding and I let him pull me to my feet and back to the steps we had occupied before. We sat down just as my parents popped out of the now very thin crowd. “What is wrong, Asriel?” My mother asked as they came up to us. I realized the shocked look must still be on my face.

“Nothing,” I lied. “I just realized I left my money at home, for when we get to the city.”

My mom sighed in relief that nothing was actually wrong. “Do not worry, we can give you both some when we get there.” She straightened before going on. “Come, there is still much of the day left.”

We left the winter town through the opposite side we arrived by. Most monsters did not look at us twice as we left, back to their usual lives. Some waved, but not many. Most looked lost in thought. When we were almost out of town, I looked back. I saw the rabbit monster with her daughter in her arms from before. Two more children, little older than the baby, were wrapped around her legs now as well. The monster smiled at us and waved. I heard the bundle give out a cry, and I couldn’t help but smile as well. They, at least, had hope in this new future. And that meant I wasn’t alone in that either.

“I’m not giving up.” I told Chara as we walked through the forest. We had dropped a bit behind my parents so that they wouldn’t overhear.

“Give up what?” He asked.

“I _will_ find a way to get monsters to accept that not all humans are bad. I promise.”

Chara just shrugged. “I don’t really care what anyone thinks of me, as long as we’re friends.”

My brother may not care, but I certainly did. He could pretend it didn’t affect him, but I saw that it did and I still wanted nothing more than to see the sadness gone from his eyes forever. I kept that image of the mother and her children in my mind. It gave me hope. Briefly, I remember wondering if I’d ever see them again.

 

“We’re not taking the river boat?” I asked as we approached the edge of the forest.

“Of course not,” My dad said excitedly. “We have to give Chara the full tour, don’t we?” He stopped all of the sudden making mom turn, confused, and making Chara and I almost run into the back of his legs. He turned and looked at me. “Come to think of it, you have never seen much of Waterfall yourself, have you?”

It was true, I hadn’t, and what I had seen I remember being a sight to behold. I was definitely looking forward to seeing more of it. “Besides,” my dad went on. “There is someone I would like to see myself.”

I had been to Waterfall once in my life before that day. It was three years prior; we had taken the river boat down to near the bottom of the tunnels that make it up before walking up a bit to a cave with a large lake that glowed like a jewel. Actual jewels glittered in the ceiling. I had never seen stars before, but I knew what they were and I remember thinking that even their lookalikes were beautiful. I spent most of that day swimming in the lake and resting with my parents when I became too tired. At one point, I remember a conversation they had with each other.

“I am surprised this place has not filled up as well.” My mom commented absently.

“I don’t think it ever will, really.” My dad said in response. “More than any, this place reflects the world above. I don’t think monsters will ever want to spoil that. Besides, it’s too easy to get lost. We have enough trouble with traps and mazes we set up ourselves; we don’t need to be dealing with one that was already here for us.”

I had studied maps of Waterfall since that day. It really was a huge maze of snaking tunnels. It was apparently formed by the runoff of a large underground river above it and there was still much of it that barely anyone had explored. There was only one monster that had explored it, actually, and it turned out that was the monster my father wanted to see.

We descended through the topmost cavern with all too much haste in my opinion. Already that was far more amazing than the lake I had been to before. Countless waterfalls spilled out of the walls around us funneling into one pool at the bottom. The falling water had shaped the rock around it, making the cascades so intricate they defied the eye in places. It really was a place you had to see to believe. The path from Snowdin spiraled down the falls going in front of some, and beneath others. Much to mom’s displeasure, Chara and I did not care about getting wet. I would have stood under one of the falls if my mom had not actually pulled me away from it. The water was warm as it misted on my fur and it made me want to forgo going further and just spend the rest of the day there.

At the bottom, the overflow from the pool of water in the center became a singular wide river that flowed deeper into the depths of the tunnels. We followed its bank a ways before my dad suddenly took a turn down one of the tunnels that looked no different than any of the others we had passed every so often. After a ways down that tunnel, we turned down another, and then another. Quickly, the times between when my dad would make a turn became shorter, and the number of times where we doubled back increased. My dad would grunt to himself every time before we turned around. Eventually, my mom tapped him on the arm.

“You are not lost, are you dear?” My mom said skeptically.

“No, I am not lost.” My dad assured us, still looking up and down tunnels before shaking his head as we went on. “The problem is I have no idea where _he_ would be…”

“You did send him a message, yes?” mom questioned, stepping aside as dad suddenly decided to go the other way.

We stopped. Both of my parents had small flames dancing over their shoulders. It cast a strange light in the tunnel. “I did, but there is no telling if he actually received the message or not.”

“Well, we cannot spend all day wandering through tunnels.” My mom reminded him. “We do need to make it to the city at some point.”

“We could leave a note and wait for them back at the entrance.” I suggested. I really wanted to go swimming.

My parents both looked down at me. The lights behind them cast shadows over their faces so I couldn’t tell if they were considering it or not. I gave a hopeful smile regardless.

“Well, well. It seems my tail wasn’t being pulled after all.” A voice came from behind us. It was a voice that I actually knew quite well, as it turned out. From behind us, Gerson, the Hammer of Justice, stepped out of the shadows. The old turtle had a big smile on his face that took us all in. Unlike many monsters, when he saw Chara that smile did not slip, though I’m certain I saw surprise cross his face. He leaned down to get a better look at him. “And who might this little scamp be?” This monster, like my mom and dad, was one of the few that were alive in the time before monsters were trapped underground. He had actually seen humans, talked with them, lived with them, and yet his reaction was completely different than I expected.

Gerson patted Chara on the head before he could dodge behind any of us. My brother simply looked up at him curiously after that as the old monster reached into one of the packs he had all around him and pulled out a red stone about the size of a gold coin. He held it out to Chara who took it out of curiosity more so than anything else. The stone seemed to glow as it passed to Chara’s hand; a soft red light to match his soul. “I thought as much.” Gerson said. “You’re quite the strong one, aren’t you?” Chara was too busy staring in wonder to answer. “I’ve got some more interesting bobbles that I’ve collected down here. Why don’t you two go check them out while us old folk chat?” Gerson handed me a bag amongst the many he had on his person.

“That sounds like a wonderful idea.” My mom chimed in. She was at our backs a second later pushing us down a little ways down the tunnel. She sat down with us and started picking things out of the bag I had been given and explaining what she thought they were to Chara and I. I only half paid attention, I kept one eye on Gerson and my dad who I could still dimly see down the tunnel and I could still hear them well enough.

Like any kid, I hated being kept out of the loop just because people thought I was too young. Really, if they didn’t want me listening, they should have been less obvious that was what they were trying to avoid.

“So, I take it that was the reason you wanted to talk?” The old turtle asked my father. I watched him pull all of his packs off of his back and toss them against the wall of the tunnel before leaning against the stone himself and pulling what looked like a pipe from his shirt pocket. He lit it with a brief spell and drew on it heavily.

“That, and a few other things.” My father towered over the other monster. The turtle barely made it past my father’s waist. My dad put a hand on the other monster’s shoulder. “It is good to see you, old friend. But, may I ask, what is it you are doing here? It is nowhere near where we agreed to meet.”

“Me? Oh, I haven’t been up to much. Just seeing if there are any more treasures to be found in this mountain. As to why I’m here now, why, hiding of course. You see, this young girl has taken to following me around for weeks now yelling at me to train her to fight and how to be a hero like me.” The monster chuckled and shook his head. “I’m far too old for that much excitement.”

“I see…” My father did not seem to see at all. He looked through the wafts of smoke that drifted up from the other monster as if he did not understand at all.

“But to the point,” the monster went on, “where did _you_ manage to dig up a human?”

My dad turned his head towards us for a moment. I made a show of picking up one of the things my mom had placed on the ground and looking it over. It was another stone, like the one Chara had been given, but this one was a deep blue and it did not glow. “My son found them.”

The monster looked up. “Do you think there’s a hole in the barrier somewhere after all?”

My dad leaned against the wall himself before answering. “No, we’ve known for a while that things can cross to this side of the barrier with no issue. I think your own explorations prove that.” He paused. “How have things been on this side of the mountain?”

The turtle inspected his pipe briefly before tapping it out against his shell. “Your meetings not tell you all of that?”

“You know as well as I do people hold things back.”

The old turtle shrugged. “It’s been about as good as it can be, I guess. City’s hit the edge of the dome everywhere, except near the barrier. Pretty soon people are going to start complaining it’s too crowded. They don’t want to build any higher because they say it will spoil the view.”

“And Home wants to abandon the whole city.” My father half chuckled without mirth.

“That fellow in Hotland finally figured out how all of that human tech we’ve been finding recently works.” Gerson went on. “He’s been building some kind of giant machine to adapt it to our needs. He says it’ll be finished soon.”

“I knew about that already.” My dad interjected. “The council made it sound like the idea was doomed to fail and was ludicrous to start.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that. Ask him yourself, if you see him.”

“I planned to. Anything else?”

“Only whatever news you bring, I suppose. If I had to gander a guess, I’d say you’re going to the city to show off your little tagalong, am I right.”

“You’re half right. And they are not a tagalong; they are a member of my family.”

The monster choked as he drew on his pipe once more, coughing up smoke before managing, “Now that’s something I never expected to hear in my life. Mind explaining that one to me?”

My dad was quite for a minute. “Remember the days when we would all stand at the top of the keep? We looked out over the valley and talked about what we had planned once we were in charge of everything.”

“You mean how we all used to spew our crazy grand schemes to the world? What with your wife’s schools and libraries of the entire world’s knowledge, me and my ‘impenetrable bastions of defense’, and your absurd idea of a city that spanned the entire world?” The monster fully laughed out loud that time. “The only lick of sense to ever come out of the four of us was from _him_. He was the one that actually had any practical plans once rein was passed to him and ways to see those plans through.”

My father laughed as well. “Leo always was the most sensible of us. But he lacked imagination, in my opinion. He lacked faith. I’ve realized, recently, that I have as well. That child, Chara, gives me hope that those days we envisioned may still be ahead of us. I mean to make everyone else see that as well.”

“That’s a tall order, especially after so long. Most monsters blame the humans for everything, even the smallest of things, and they’re only ever half joking at most.”

My father sighed. “I understand their anger, but I do not understand how it could have lasted this long. At the start of all of this, when the child first found himself with us, I realized I was acting the same way. I was still outraged by what the humans did to us, but then I asked myself, why am I still angry? And I realized that I was only holding on to the past for the sake of it and nothing more. All of the humans that did us any wrong are long gone. The world has changed, new avenues present themselves, and I think it’s time we started exploring them.”

The old turtle harrumphed. “Well, we’ll see about that, won’t we?”

“You don’t sound very confident.”

“I’d like that to work just as much as you do, but my job has always been to point out the problems you don’t see and fix them when they happen, hasn’t it? The look in that one’s eye, I’ve seen it before; it may spell trouble.”

“I’ve seen it too, and I know quite well what it means. That is my other motivation. No one should have to live with that fear in their heart.”

I didn’t understand. Were they talking about Chara? Did my father see the way his smile did not sometimes touch his eyes as well? Did he see the way sometimes Chara would look around as he laughed, as if expecting to wake up to find everything a dream? But he saw something deeper to it, was there? No, Chara would have told me if something was bugging him. Trouble? I didn’t think so. And what fear was he talking about? A fear of monsters? Maybe that was it after all.

“My son seems to be doing better than me on that front, though. The two of them are practically inseparable.” I caught my father saying. I realized I had missed some of the conversation in my thoughts.

“It’s good that he has a friend.” Gerson said in response. “It seems he has a lot more energy than last time I saw him too.”

“Yes, I believe we are finally past the point of worry. Though, my wife doesn’t seem to think so.” I saw mom shoot my father a look next to me and he cleared his throat. “Anyway, I feel we must start getting on our way. We still have much to do today.”

“That’s a shame.” Gerson said. “I miss talking with you, old friend.”

“Well, you’ll have plenty of chances in the days to come. We’re finally moving.”

For some reason, that shocked the monster more than anything else. He almost doubled over in a coughing fit after hearing the news. “What?” he shouted.

A short time later, we were ready to move on once more. “I’ll send for you once we have everything settled.” My father told the turtle. “I’d like to hear more about your young stalker.”

The monster suddenly looked like he’d rather be anywhere than there. “Hmph, I’d rather avoid any talk about that myself…”

After goodbyes were said, we were walking through the tunnels once more. I waved to Gerson as we left him. Before he was out of sight, I saw the old turtle turn and jump in fright. “Holy salt and seaweed, girl, how did you get back there?” he seemed to say something else after, but we turned a corner before I caught anymore.

We stopped for lunch in the cave I had been to when we had visited before, much to my pleasure. I took in the sights, eating a sandwich while Chara continued to stare at the stone he had gotten from Gerson. While we ate, my parents talked about what they would say when we got to the city while Chara and I talked about what we wanted the house to look like. “It could be this big castle that overlooks the whole city where we can stand at the top and wave to every monster all at once.” I was saying.

“That sounds like fun. But if it can be anything, it should also look like how our house looks now.” Chara said in response.

“I don’t think those two things can go together…” I told him. He simply shrugged.

Chara and I finished eating first and were given permission to look around a bit. I was glad; there was one thing in Waterfall that I wanted to show Chara that we had not run across yet.

I pulled my brother through the marshy weeds that rimmed the glowing lake until we were almost circled around the other side. There, I found what I was looking for: an echo flower. The pale blue blossom shimmered in a similar way to the lake next to it. I gestured to Chara to stay quiet before he could question what I was doing. As we got closer, we heard a passing conversation, “…are you sure it’s over here?”

“Yes. I’m certain. I’ve been here many times, I’ll have you know.”

“You’ve been here once, and I was with you then too.”

“You don’t know what I do in my spare time!”

“Yes, I do. And it certainly isn’t coming here.”

“Well, I was very thorough in memorizing this cave the last time we came.”

“Really? Which way did we come from?”

“… I didn’t say it was one hundred percent thorough!”

There was laughter. “It’s alright sweetie, this night has already been perfect. You don’t need to try so hard.”

The conversation faded and then it started again from the beginning.

Chara spoke up before I could stop him or pull him away. “What was that?” he said and I tried not to groan.

“It’s an echo flower.” I told him, my irritation clear. “It will repeat the last thing said near it over and over again until someone else says something near it.”

His eyes darted between me and the flower. “Is it…?” He trailed off.

“Yes.” I said bluntly.

“Oh…” He went silent and tried to back away.

I sighed. “Well, it’s too late now; you might as well say something.”

“Like what?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know, like this: to whoever’s listening, remember to be nice to someone today. Now you say something.”

“I don’t know what to say after that!”

“Just say anything, it doesn’t matter.”

“Okay…” He leaned closer to the flower. “H-hi, umm… I hope you’re having a good day? I am. I got to meet a baby today, and I got to see this place. It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

I smiled at my brother and he smiled back. After a moment, the flower began to repeat Chara’s initial question, and we quietly began walking back to my parents who had already finished cleaning up by the time we got there.

We continued our way down until Waterfall became Hotland. If the cold of Snowdin had made Chara look miserable, the molten rock beneath the path into Hotland made him look like he might pass out. Thankfully, we weren’t planning on staying long. My dad simply wanted to talk to the Royal Scientist whose lab bordered the two regions. Then we just had to take an elevator up and we would be in New Home. Most of the monsters that lived in Hotland would be in the city already anyway, apparently. Mom never got around to explaining why, but I would have guessed it had something to do with that machine being build I had heard bits and pieces of.

The lab was a large metal rectangle that spanned the cave from top to bottom and probably went farther than that in both directions. I had never met the royal scientist at that time. My parents only mentioned him once or twice, and they never said much. But what they did say made me want to meet him even more.

We walked up to the door and my dad gave it a knock. We waited for a response or for the door to open, but there was nothing. He knocked again and I heard a crash come from inside, and a moment later, “Yes, yes, what is it?” a voice came from a circular grate near the door. I peered into it, but there was no hole to the inside. Where was the noise coming from?

“Is everything alright in there?” My father asked raising his voice to be heard through the door.

“King Asgore!” The voice realized. There was a shuffling of papers and something metal clanging to the floor that I realized was also coming from the strange noise-making grate. “I… um… Yes… no, I mean…” The voice stumbled on. “It’s under control, anyway. Uh… I would invite you in, but for reasons I’m not entirely able to explain I can’t at the moment.”

“Is this a bad time?” My dad asked, speaking into the grate that time.

“No! Nononono, not all. Well, maybe. I’m honestly not so sure myself anymore.”

“I can come back at a different time, if you would prefer.”

There was silence for a moment. “What? Yes, yes I think that may be best. I will tell you what I’ve been up to then, if I can make heads or tails of it myself before then.” The last was whispered as if he had forgotten we could hear.

“There is one thing I wanted to ask.” My dad tried. “Has there been any progress with the barrier?”

“What, that?” He said as if dismissing it as unimportant. “I’ve been letting my new assistant look into that. She’s quite the prodigy, actually. I will have her findings complied for you as well. Now where was I…?”

The noise from inside cut off; Chara and I exchanged confused looks and my parents did much the same. My dad tried the door again, but there was no response once more.

“I am starting to reconsider the wisdom behind putting him in charge of everything.” My mom said as we went to the elevator.

“He has always been a little scattered, but always for the best reasons.” My father reasoned. “If it has his attention that much, I’m sure it will prove to be far more important than the barrier in the end. Remember, we have to think about thing to help us once we are out as well.”

While in the elevator, my mom gave Chara and me a change of clothes. After running around both Snowdin and Waterfall my pants were looking a bit worse for wear. Chara definitely needed it more than I did, though. He looked like he had somehow managed to go swimming with all of his clothes on while we weren’t looking.

My parents looked as regal as ever, nothing ever seemed to alter that. Sometimes I think they used magic to do it. I never asked Chara if they did or not, come to think of it.

After another minute, the elevator slowed to a stop and the doors opened to the noisy streets of New Home. Heads turned to see who the new arrivals were and suddenly monsters were surrounding us, practically shouting greetings and questions. A visit from the royal family this far away from Home was rare, but it was always startling to see just how much some looked up to us.

My mom and dad met every monster with a smile and a friendly greeting. Some asked why they were there, some asked about how we were doing, but all of them had this look of anticipation on their face, like they knew that big news was coming. Finally, one specific monster managed their way through the crowd: my father’s surrogate in New Home. The Astigmatism stumbled his way to my father before asking much the same questions as the others, but he looked worried. A surprise visit usually spelled trouble for him.

“Have word sent out to the city.” My father told him after assuring him that there were no problems. “All monsters are to attend an announcement by the king and queen this evening.”

“Concerning what, your highness?” The monster asked, still sounding nervous.

“The future,” My dad said simply. That got people whispering, but they asked no more questions as we started walking out of the crowd towards where the speech would be made, monsters parting around us as we went.

We made our way to the other side of the city, getting stopped occasionally to talk to a few monsters before telling them about the announcement and going on our way again. Eventually the buildings just stopped. A wide semicircle of bare rock separated the city from that part of the dome’s edge where a path wound its way up the side to the barrier. No monster wanted to live anywhere close to that thing, and understandably so.

My parents stood near the center pointing and talking between themselves. I had suspected that it would be where we made our new home. I was excited, really. But, standing there, looking up at the entrance to the tunnel that led to our seal, I suddenly felt a little scared.

Chara pulled me back from my imaginings. “What now?” he asked me.

“We wait.” I told him. It would be a few hours still until word would spread through the whole city and were able to make it there. “Can you see it?” I asked him. “Can you see the barrier?” His power was not always limited to line of sight, and surely something as powerful as that could be visible if nothing else. I pointed at where I had been looking before. Chara stood next to me a gazed up at the tunnel. He squinted; it could’ve been in concentration or like suddenly staring at something bright. I couldn’t tell.

“No,” he said after another moment. He turned away. “What does it look like, anyway?”

“Nothing you need feel worried about.” My mom said as she came over us.

“But we’re going to be moving here, aren’t we?” I asked.

My mom looked around her again. “Yes, I believe we will be.” She said half absently. She sounded like she was looking forward to it too. “But it will still be a world away, as far as we are concerned. How are you doing, Asriel? Are you hungry at all? There’s still some time until the announcement. You could take a nap if you would like.” And there’s my mom back to being my mom. I shook my head; walking around a lot had not been enough to exhaust me for years now. Though she seemed not to accept it, she at least moved on. “How about you Chara? Would you like a snack?” My brother nodded eagerly. I remember thinking that one of those day I’d need to try human food to see what was really so different about it. If it was enough to cut Chara down to three meals a day instead of twelve, it could most likely keep me full for a week.

I must have said as much out loud at the time as well, because Chara had his arm wrapped around my shoulders a moment later trying to shove a snack in my mouth. We both laughed as I tried to fight him off. I noticed someone else laughing as well and I stopped. My brother did so as well. We turned our heads to see mom with a hand over her mouth. “Look at you,” she said once she had calmed down enough. “My two boys, always causing trouble.” She wrapped her arms around us and held us close. “You have too much of your father in you; both of you do.”

I laughed off my embarrassment while I watched Chara freeze up at what my mom had said for some reason. When my mom let us go, he seemed to slump like only strings tied to his shoulders were holding him up. He stared at nothing. I put a hand on his arm and he snapped back, but his smile did not return.

“Here,” my mom went on, pulling more out of her bag. “This is an excellent picture, Asriel.” She put down the drawing I had been working on earlier in front of me. “You should finish it up and show me what other wonderful ideas you have for our new home in New Home… Honestly, I have no idea what your father was thinking with that one.” It had been more than seven hundred years and it would be seven hundred more before she let that one go. “You too, Chara, why don’t you show me what you think our home should look like?”

As mom went back to dad, Chara and I lay on the ground. I was scribbling onto a new sheet of paper a hallway with high walls and tapestries hanging around the windows with the delta rune carved into the glass and both humans and monsters walking through it. I noticed my brother just staring off into space again. I poked him. “Something wrong?” he shook his head. The lack of vocal response told me he was lying. Bugging him about it normally didn’t get me anywhere, but I didn’t want to see him sad today of all days. “Are you sure?” I tried. He nodded. “Was it the monsters back in Snowdin?”

“I’m fine, Asriel.” He told me flatly. The last thing I wanted to do was make him angry, so I dropped it, but I didn’t give up.

Trying a different tactic, I quickly got to work on another piece of paper. After a minute I tapped him again. He looked up and had to force back his laughter. “Look!” I said with the piece of paper cut to look like petals around my head. “I’m an echo flower!”

“You look so dumb.” Chara said through giggles.

“You look so dumb.” I echoed.

“Seriously, take that thing off.”

“Seriously, take that thing off.”

Chara stood up and gave me a look that said, ‘fine, have it your way.’ I mirrored the look as well.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“Have you seen my brother?”

“Have you seen my brother?”

“He’s real handsome, you know, and kind of a genius.”

“He’s kinda dumb and smells a little funny.” I burst out laughing. Chara looked angrier than he had before, but only on the surface. He took the marker he still had in his hand and darted for my face, drawing a neat red line between my eyes. “Hey!” I shouted.

“There,” he said. “Now you look better.”

The rest of the time was spent trying to get that mark out my fur. And I could only hope I was successful, really, as every time I asked Chara about it he said it was gone. I stopped believing him after the second time.

The crowd trickled in slowly at first. Soon they filled the streets and the rooftops. My mom and dad made a podium rise from the ground of the clearing and mom stood atop it assuring everyone that they were in the right place and to make enough room for everyone to see and hear. “Smaller monsters should come further to the front and do not be afraid to enter the clearing. It is perfectly all right, I assure you, and there are many monsters that still have yet to arrive.” She repeated, voice amplified by magic.

Another hour or so later, they nodded to each other that everyone who would come was there. My dad gestured us to the platform they made around the podium and we went over. “What is that on your face, Asriel?” was the first thing he asked me. Chara snickered and I scowled at him.

The next second we were rising up into the air with the platform. Several dozen feet into the air, we stopped. My mom, still at the podium, took everyone in her gaze and began. “It has been quite a long time since we stood before you all like this, has it not? At this point, it could almost be said it goes against ceremony. I know you all must be very anxious to find out what this is all about. There are several points we came to address today, starting with one very important one: By now I am sure you have all heard the rumor of a human in the Underground. We are here to tell you that it is true. He is with us here and will continue to be, as a part of our family formally from this day forth.” Murmurs rippled through the crowd, silenced by my mom’s hand in the air. “Allow us to explain. Asgore?”

My dad placed a hand on both of our heads before stepping up to the podium and taking mom’s place. He looked out over everyone much the same way that she had. He took a deep breath and became very serious. “A thousand years ago,” he began, “before we were trapped underground, monsters and humans walked side by side. We laughed together, we ate together, played together, learned together. There was peace. A peace I had fought long and hard for.

“I was reminded recently of a time where I was little more than a boy. My closest friend and I running through the streets and ramparts of a human castle, losing ourselves to the joy in a moment where we could forget our troubles, our responsibilities, and most importantly, the world around us.

“I will not try to hide the fact that after we were trapped under this mountain I was worried for a very long time about the future of our race and my line. I once thought, ‘how could I, or anyone, justify bringing a child into this cloistered world where their troubles are inescapable and the peace that I once knew not possible? Where could anyone find happiness in that?’ But, as time passed and I saw that monsters _were_ making lives for themselves, I realized that no trouble is inescapable, and that there is no problem that monsters cannot overcome and find happiness. My viewpoint has changed, now. And much of what I once thought was impossible have been proven time and time again to not be the case. Now that I’ve had a son of my own, I see in the happiness in his eyes everyday a constant reminder that nothing is impossible.

“Not long ago, my son discovered something deep in the ancient part of the Underground. He discovered yet another impossibility: he found a human. My son, at the risk of his own life, brought the injured child to our home. He cared for them, he befriended them. He did not care about differences between humans and monsters; he did not care about the ancient animosities between our peoples. He saw only another soul that needed help, and what blossomed from that was more than I could have ever wished.

“I found myself thinking for the first time in a long time that perhaps there is hope for our future. Much has changed since that day the child was brought to us. The human has entered the folds of our family, and life has become… quite hectic with two children running around our home. So, to continue this trend of change, we have decided to make a new home here, in New Home, as a way of solidifying a new peace between humans and monsters. And as we continue to make an effort of returning to the surface, I hope it is the first step to a bright future.”

He paused, looking away for a moment. “I understand if some of you find this somewhat hard to accept at first. Some of the first things monsters are taught are what humans have done to us long ago, and that buries prejudices deep. But I seek to rectify that as well. In the days to come I hope you come to see that we were wrong to hold on to hate as long as we have. Because my son did not just find a human that day, he found a friend. And a brother.”

After the speech, my mother went over the finer details of their plan before we descended back to the ground. Then, mom went off to talk to some monsters about getting the resources together to build the house while dad answered questions.

Chara was looking up at the sky as the day ended. The sun in the world above was beginning to set, and the spell weaved over the city was turning into a crystal clear view of the night sky as it once was to us. There were quite a few caves in Waterfall where the stones in the ceiling looked like stars, but nowhere close to this. “Wow.” Chara said.

“Yeah, wow.”

 

It was another couple of months until we actually made the move. Building materials were in short supply in the Underground, which meant they all had to be made magically, which meant it took time. Nothing really exciting happened during those months.

We took several more trips into the city; for the most part we were well received. I spent most of my time there trying to learn the layout of the city and meeting many of the monsters there. I told Chara he should too, but I don’t think much effort was made on his part, at least in the beginning. I quickly learned that there really wasn’t much difference between Home and New Home. The center of the larger city had the same layout; all that was missing was the theater, and where it would have stood was where our home was slowly taking shape.

Chara and I went to Home to play more often as well, under supervision of course. Most monsters seemed to pretend that that day Chara was first revealed never happened. I didn’t really complain, but it made me question.

We never saw that group of kids again.

Over time, little by little, Chara seemed to come to accept his new lot in life at last. He seemed happier, he talked more to monsters other than me and my parents, and he started to show interest in actually learning magic. Chara even started taking an interest in my own education. Both my parents seemed tickled by the idea of a monster _and_ a human ruling the Underground one day. I certainly liked the thought of it.

There was one thing that stuck out, come to think of it; something I should have read more into at the time. After they found out he was human, monsters always had questions ready for Chara when they saw him. He was very quiet at first with all of them, but he grew more comfortable with them after a time. There was always one question he did not answer, though. Whenever a monster would ask him what the surface is like he would simply shrug. I asked him why one day.

“They want to hear about how nice it is. I don’t know if I want to lie to them…” That answer surprised me. I asked him what he meant. “It’s not a nice place. I hate it. It smells, everyone’s rude, there’s nothing to do.”

“There must be something you like…” I tried. He shook his head.

“Why do monsters want to go there so badly?” He asked. “I wish they would stop asking about stuff like that…” I didn’t know how to respond to that, because, in a way, I agreed with him. But, they didn’t stop, unfortunately. Eventually it became Chara’s only real source of irritation. He would give monsters more and more rude remarks to try to dodge the question and I would have to yell at him. Until one day.

I was getting ready to interrupt yet another asinine response from Chara, but instead he was silent and then he told the monster, “There was this bridge near where I used to live. It went over the river and connected the city to the suburbs just outside of it. It was huge, taller than the dome, longer than it was wide and wider than six streets. It was quiet too. The wind from the river would drown out the noise of the city and it was always closed so no cars would go over it. I used to go there a lot to be alone.”

Where had that come from? I thought. The monster must not have found it as out of the ordinary as I had, for they asked “Do you miss that place?”

Chara shook his head. “I don’t need to be alone anymore.”

Eventually the day of the move came. A festival had already started by the time we made it to the city. Going a shorter way than we had the first time we ended up and the cliff overlooking the city just outside of Waterfall and I got my first good look at our now finished home. The castle occupied nearly all of where the clearing had once been. Tall towers rose high above the rest of the city with walls and walkways connecting them. I was surprised to find that they were actually making something so over-the-top. My mom explained that if monsters had not used the space for seven hundred years, they never would, so we might as well. I certainly wasn’t complaining.

The evening was filled with food, drink and more speeches until finally the last stone of the castle was ceremoniously set and we were allowed to enter. Mom and Dad led us through the interior. Many of the halls were understandably empty. That would change in the weeks to come.

I was surprised to find what lay at the center of the castle. Chara and I stepped through the doorway first and into our old home tucked away inside of the massive fortress of stone. It was exactly the same. We ran to our room. The furniture was even the same. It was already full of our stuff which had come ahead of us. The only real difference was that there were two beds now against opposite walls of the room.

“What do you think?” My dad said, joining us in the doorway. “Is it everything you both wanted?”

I didn’t even answer. I just slammed myself down on my new bed and smiled, drinking it all in.

 

A few days later, Chara and I were running through some of the upper towers that crawled up the side of the dome. We could indeed see the whole city from up there and found ourselves doing just that more often than not. One such afternoon had devolved into a game of tag and I was it. Base, as always, was the fountain in the center of the courtyard in front of the castle far below us. We always shocked a couple of monsters as we’d burst from the bushes into the new public park. It was honestly pretty funny.

As we ran across ramparts and down spiraling staircases, I was shocked to see Chara suddenly jump over one of the walls. I ran to the edge and watched him walk down the side of the wall as if it were flat ground. “Hey! That’s cheating!” I yelled down at him.

He looked back up at me and stuck his tongue out at me. “You never said no magic!” He yelled back. I groaned and kept running, trying in vain to catch up. Surprisingly, about halfway back down the castle, I did catch up to him and I picked up my pace to try to tag him.

Before I reached him, though, I realized he had stopped and was looking over the parapet at something below. I joined him at the wall. He was looking down at a clearing surrounded by a stone building on all four sides. In the clearing several monsters stood in a square moving in unison. “It’s a barracks.” I told Chara, answering the question he was sure to be about to ask. “For training monsters.”

“For what?”

“For fighting.”

He looked at me, puzzled. “Why?”

“Some monsters have a natural tendency towards more… destructive magic. So they teach each other how to control it better.”

“Do you think they’ll let us join?”

Where did that come from? “Why would you want to?” I found myself asking.

“Why not? It sounds like fun. We imagine ourselves battling for fun all the time; why not learn how to do it properly?”

I don’t think it will be the same…”

“Come on! It will be _just_ like playing pretend except we never have to go looking for sticks.”

“And we’ll actually have some idea what we’re doing.” I was already picturing it in my head. I had seen what that training did to monsters: it made them the strongest out of any of us; strong enough to go toe to toe with my dad, most of the time. Maybe, I thought, maybe it could do that for me too.

“I see that look. Is that a yes?” Chara asked, breaking me out of my thoughts.

I nodded. “We’ll ask, but don’t get your hopes up.

He rolled his eyes. “And you say I’m the pezzmistic one.”

“Pessimistic. And I’m not; I’m being realistic is all.” Optimistic, more like it. I had the suspicion my mom might try to tie us to our beds after this one, but I was willing to try, if it meant a chance at becoming stronger. I swallowed as we began walking back home. The actual question was the easy part, I told myself. Just ask ‘Chara and I would like to join the training for the guard, can we?’

Now, I meant it when I said my parents never really fought again after that day in Home, but if any time could have been called close, the conversation that followed that question would have been it.

“Absolutely not!” My mother dismissed immediately. “There is absolutely no reason you would ever need to be a part of something so dangerous and meaningless-”

Then my dad interrupted. “Hold on, Tori. Chara may benefit greatly from the training given the magical power he has demonstrated already, and if Asriel wants to join as well, I don’t think we should stop him. It may do him some good.” Her head whipped to face him. To say she seemed unconvinced would be an understatement. “Besides,” my father went on, scratching his ear, “I may have already let someone there age join.”

My mom did not like hearing that. “What?” She practically screamed.

She was in my father’s face in a moment, ready to tell him exactly what she thought about that and what she thought about only hearing it for the first time just then, but dad chimed in first. “She was practically begging Gerson to train her!” he explained. “We both thought this would be enough to satiate her. As it turns out it wasn’t, but she’s showing great promise, more so than some who have been doing it for years.”

My mom’s gaze became even more intense. I felt myself shiver and she wasn’t even looking at me. Chara and I both still just stood there waiting for an answer, afraid of whatever can of snails we may have accidentally opened.

“Bedroom. Now.” My mom said in a low growl. “You are going to explain to me, in great detail, about why you would let any child, let alone my sons, participate in that training. And then I am going to decide whether or not I accept that explanation and whether or not I should lock you in a closet until you can remember what it means to be responsible for those you watch over, because you seem to have forgotten in your old age.”

Have I mentioned that my mom can be very scary when she wants to be? As my dad was dragged into the other room by one of his horns, Chara and I still stood in the hallway next to the kitchen, unsure what to do with ourselves at that point. “I told you this was a bad idea.” I breathed.

“Don’t give up yet!” Chara told me.

I rolled my eyes. “You saw mom, there’s no way she’ll allow this.”

“I don’t know, your dad seemed like he really thought it was a good idea.”

“Maybe…” We stood in silence for a moment longer. “Well, what now?”

“I’m hungry.” Chara said blandly.

I rolled my eyes again. “Of course you are.”

 

That night I was surprised to learn that we were allowed to join the training, under the condition that if we come home with even the smallest injury once we get pulled out until we’re old enough. We were told that we’d get to start the next day if we’d like. Chara and I were both so excited that we barely got any sleep. We went back and forth on what we thought it would be like, what we’d learn and how we could show it off. I thought about that other girl as well. Could it be the one I heard Gerson talking about in Waterfall? It had to be. I wondered what she could have been like to want to learn to fight so badly. Chara and I both had theories, but we couldn’t really agree on anything there. What we did agree on was that tomorrow would definitely be exciting. I wish we had known just how right we were.


	5. The First Signs

I should mention, in hindsight, that I should have realized something was wrong. You see, Chara was a wreck when I first found him. He used to overreact to everything, jump away from the slightest touch, get wary around the strangest things, and he would go into one of his hushes about as often as a new day came around. I know that all I’ve really been doing was focusing on the best of times, but… There’s something you need to understand about my brother. He was… damaged. There’s really no other word for it. And as much as I tried to help fix him, all of the progress he seemed to make would just go out the window as soon as we left my room. For months it was like this. And then, the last month before we move, it was like a switch was hit in Chara’s head. For someone like that, to make so major a change so quickly, as happy as I was to see it, it wasn’t right. Because, nothing had changed.

Monsters still reacted the same way around him. Never to his face, though. No, never that. I would see the looks when they thought I didn’t see, hear the whispers at our backs, and if I could catch them, then Chara definitely did. But, he never said anything to them. I did myself, a couple of times, but Chara would only try to stop me. He would have rather just ignored it until it all went away. But that’s no way to deal with your problems.

More often than not, his smile was still false; a mask to hide how he felt behind his supposed happiness. Only I seemed to notice, though; mom never saw it, dad never saw it. But even I thought it was just because he was trying to get better at dealing with people, at being more open and more social. And I was happy for him, for trying to make that effort; I encouraged it.

I had thought that the pain I saw in Chara when I first met him had finally gone away and that what I saw was simply the result of his new struggle, but that wasn’t the case. I should have seen it… But I didn’t see any of this at the time. It wasn’t until we started the training that all of it hit me. And I still feel like such an idiot for not putting all the pieces together sooner.

 

I honestly didn’t know what to expect as we made our way to the training hall that next morning. I knew what it was like for other monsters that joined, as a good prince should, but we were several years too young to be allowed in under normal circumstances. Monsters may be born with the ability to use their resonance, but it usually didn’t manifest into anything potentially dangerous until they were about two decades old. It’s how long a decent amount of magic power takes to build up in us. Thus, most of the monsters that went were around the age of twenty with the youngest, up until recently, being fifteen.

But we were the exceptions to the rule: a boss monster and a human. As a boss monster, my strength in magic should have been equivalent to a normal adult monster’s by the time I was six, and would become exponentially greater for decades to come as I became an adult myself. And, well, I think we all know what Chara is capable of by now.

There was one other exception, younger than us as it turned out, and she had already been part of the training for more than a month. I had just found out her name earlier that morning: Undyne. Questions about her still occupied my thoughts more than what the training would be like as we pushed our way through the streets of New Home. How strong must she be to have been allowed in so early? Could she be even stronger than Chara, at least, as he was now? What was she like? My dad said she wanted to be a hero. Certainly someone like that would be nice, right?

The entrance hall of the building dedicated to training the strongest monsters in the Underground was very much a grandiose sight. Fluted columns rose to an arched ceiling high above our heads and the hall was cast in a golden light that made it all seem even grander. It was common motif amongst monster architecture, and it was my mom’s idea originally. “Every place one enters should fill them with strength and hope.” she would say, and it certainly never lost its effect on me. She had a knack for coming up with spells like that.

My dad walked in front of us as we made our way down the hall and deep into the building. In addition to being a training ground the building also served as a place for the monsters there to live if it brought them far from home and the place had become quite large because of that.

“Nervous?” My father asked, turning his head back to glance down at us. “I could hardly get a word in to tell you two to get ready back home. But you haven’t said anything at all since we arrived.”

It was true, I was nervous about a lot, but I wasn’t about to let that stop me. “No,” I said shaking my head, “just excited!”

My dad smiled like he knew I was lying. “Hmph, well, we will see how you feel after today.”

We stepped through an archway and onto a courtyard enclosed within the building. The courtyard was a square of hard packed dirt about an acre in size subdivided by lines of cut stone set in the ground. Smaller squares were marked out along the edge which surrounded a larger square in the center. Monsters were scattered about the yard, some standing in the smaller squares sparring with one another with staffs or other wooden practice weapons. More monsters were gathered in the center, doing drills similar to those we had seen from the castle wall previously. All of the monsters there ran along the same vein of appearance: bipedal, an average of four limbs, hands as opposed to some other form of grasping appendage. There was probably some correlation to be made there, but none anyone had found any concrete evidence to support yet. All of the monsters there were also along the same range of height: much taller than me. They all wore armor of some sort as well and had this air of discipline about them. It was as if the whole atmosphere seemed to say “this is no place for kids.” I pushed the thought aside, labeling it as ridiculous. I wasn’t about to give up before giving this an honest effort, for Chara’s sake if not for my own.

There was only one monster that stood out from the group. Half the size of any other, the blue figure was on the other side of the courtyard in one of the sparring rings. I watched as she took the staff she held in her hands and knock her opponent to the ground with what looked like no effort at all, a fierce battle cry ringing from her minuscule form. Her opponent not moving to rise, she spun her weapon behind her and looked directly at me. That must have been Undyne. I could see her wide grin full of pointed teeth all the way from where I stood and it sent a shiver down my back.

More heads turned to us as we made our way into the yard. Surprise covered less faces than I would have expected; they must have been told we were coming. Most of the monsters in the courtyard wore looks of disapproval, not just for Chara, but for me as well. My father either didn’t notice or ignored it.

We walked straight to the center square. I could see now that there was one figure standing away from the others. They were pacing back and forth in front of the group that moved in unison and shouting at them before each of their quick movements. As we drew close, the monster turned to us and the group came to attention beside them. The green scaled reptilian monster was almost as tall as my dad. Long horns curved out of the top of her head and a fan of protruding bone framed her face behind her jaw. I believe you humans would call what she looked like a dragon.

The monster turned her slit eyes to my brother and me, appearing to weigh us with a glance and find us wanting. She turned back to my father. “Your highness,” she said curtly with a high amount of respect.

“Durga,” My dad said in return, nodding his head. “Is everything going well?”

“Of course, sir,” the monster beamed, clearly proud to be able to tell him so. “Everyone is making progress better than expected. Rein and Karim may even be able to finish up a few weeks early and-” my dad cut her off with a wave of his hand.

“Let’s not rush anything, shall we captain?” He told her. The other monster looked embarrassed for a moment but it was gone as soon as it was there, replaced by the image of one wishing more than anything to validate themselves. “How about the request I made, how did that go?” My dad went on.

The captain sighed. “He’s here. He fought us tooth and nail about it the whole way, but he’s here.”

My dad gave a noise that could have been a chuckle or a grunt of frustration. “If he is still unwilling, I can talk to him myself.”

“No he’s agreed to do it, but he’s not exactly happy with you.” Durga clarified. “I would wait until his mood has a chance to cool off before you spoke to him, though.”

“He won’t take it out on my children now, will he?”

The captain shrugged. “You’d know that better than I, sir.”

Dad went home soon after, leaving us in the hands of Durga, whose good mood seemed to go with him. The monster turned back to us after he was gone with more disapproval than the first time. I half expected to feel Chara ducking behind me under that gaze, but my brother held his ground beside me. “So, Miss Durga, sir,” I began, but there would be none of that.

“Let me stop you right there, ‘your highness,’” the captain interrupted. “The king may think letting the two of you join is a good idea, but I disagree. You see, you make _my_ life more complicated by being here, and I don’t like complications.” Some of the other monsters in the group next to us were now looking at us with the same contempt as their captain. “Now, you two may already be getting special treatment, but if you think that means _I_ am going to treat you any differently than any other monster here, you’ve got another thing coming, understand? And that starts with only speaking when spoken to. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes sir,” my brother and I said almost in unison. I didn’t like where this was going already.

The monster nodded, a slight amount of respect now mixed into her expression, a slight amount. “You two catch on quick. Good, you’ll need that. You may be young, but you’ll be expected to complete this course in the same amount of time as everyone else. Otherwise you make me look bad, you make them look bad,” she gestured to the monsters around her, “and you make your dad look bad. And I won’t allow any of that to happen. Here you are children no longer, so I better not see either of you acting childish in the least. I will not hear any whining, you will not get any extra breaks, you will be held to the same standard as everyone else. Got it?”

“Yes sir.” We said again.

The captain’s eyes lingered on us for another moment before turning back to the group arranged before us. “Pair up!” she shouted. “Sparring, hand to hand. Dismissed!” The group began to disperse, moving to the smaller squares around the rim of the yard. After a moment the captain began to walk away as well, gesturing for us to follow.

We went back towards the building, Chara and I, being barely up to the monster’s waist, had to practically run to keep up with her stride. I didn’t say anything about it; I didn’t ask where we were going either. I wasn’t dumb enough to make that mistake so soon and thankfully it didn’t look like Chara would be either. My brother, surprisingly, did not look at all as discouraged as I felt about this so far, if anything, he seemed even more committed than he had this morning.

We ran through several hallways until we finally came to a larger room that looked like an indoor version of the sparring rings outside. The floor was marked off in stone in a similar way but the ring itself was the same wood as the rest of the floor instead of dirt. Racks of weapons lined the walls and they weren’t the only things in the room.

Sitting in the center of the ring with his legs crossed and staring down at a book was Gerson. The old turtle looked up at us with a smirk as we entered the doorway. “About time you two showed up.” He said not unkindly. “I was about to fall asleep here.”

I felt a smile split my face. Seeing the old monster again made this morning a little better. And what the captain told us next made it even more so. “Gerson has agreed to oversee the beginning stages of your training. You should be honored.”

“As if I had a choice!” The turtle complained. “I was practically dragged here hand and foot and forced to agree. If it wasn’t for the fact that Undyne was here already, I would have told you to kiss my shell! I swear, the way the king treats his friends, it’s a wonder his kids were able to grow to be such a likeable pair.” The monster let out a loud bout of laughter.

The captain was anything but amused by the old monster. “Well, I have my own responsibilities to see to.” Durga said dryly before leaving us with our new mentor.

“Come on, don’t stand in the door way all day. We got work to do.” The old monster waved us inside and Chara and I sat down in front of him. He looked between us a moment before snapping his book shut and placing it on the ground next to him. “So, I take it by the looks on your faces that Miss Straight and Narrow already gave you her little intro speech?” The monster did not wait for a reply before going into another bout of laughter. “Don’t let her get to you, kiddos. It’s her first year in charge of the whole show here and she’s young and eager to prove herself, and me being here probably doesn’t help things. She probably thinks that if I see her slip up once that I’ll pull the whole thing out from under her feet and start running this place again myself. Phaw! I held on to this place for two hundred years too long as it is. She can have it!” Seeming to remember we were in the room, Gerson shook his head before going on.

“That aside, I agreed to come back for a little while to help out the two of you, because, frankly, the only other monster qualified to do so is your dad and he has his hands full enough already.” He leaned closer as if he did not want anyone to overhear and added. “That and this way I can keep a closer eye on Undyne too. She can go a bit overboard easily.” The monster leaned back, slapping his knee. “So, without further ado, let’s get right to it, shall we?”

Gerson cleared his throat. “First, before we begin, it is important to understand just what this training is and what it is for. And that is magic. Magic is a part of our daily lives, so much so that we think it mundane most of the time, but it can be very dangerous. In the old days we used magic for many more things than even we use it for today and we continuously sought out more ways to use it. And as a result of that study, we know that there is much that can be done with magic that shouldn’t be done with magic.

“Now, in our peaceful society, most of those magics have remained untouched for so long that they are as good as forgotten. But, every now and then they rear their ugly heads as the resonance of a few of us monsters. So, this old form of training our people to become warriors has been repurposed to the task of teaching these unfortunate souls how to control their powers. This is done in two parts. Either of you know what they are?”

I raised my hand almost immediately and Gerson chuckled. “I suspected you would, my young prince. Go ahead.”

“Well, the obvious part is practicing the magic itself.” I began. “Resonance magic is done on a much more instinctual level that other magic, but through repeated use a monster can gain a better understanding of what it is they’re doing and learn to control it better.”

The old turtle nodded. “Yes, go on.”

“Once an understanding is achieved, control gained through several methods. One is to stress test your magic, to learn everything you are capable of doing with it inside and out. Another is, well, I guess that’s the second part.”

“The second part is learning to fight, right?” Chara chimed in.

“Indeed it is.” Gerson confirmed. “Now, you might be thinking to yourself, ‘monsters are peaceful creatures, what use could any of us have in learning to fight? Especially seeing as we are trapped under this mountain where there are no immediate threats to us, and especially since we recently declared a peace with humans.’ Asriel, would you care to answer that?”

“It acts as a form of self-discipline,” I answered. “It’s been proven that the control over one’s self obtained through learning to fight greatly eases the process of learning magic. In addition it acts as a method of reinforcement from using magic incorrectly, or when you didn’t mean to.”

“Precisely! It’s all carefully thought out, you see? You can thank your father and me for that.” The old monster let out another quick bout of laughter before going on. “Now, that being said, this training applies to the both of you just a little differently. You both volunteered to join early, yes? Well, that’s all well and good because you would have had to join eventually anyway.”

The old monster turned to me before going on. “Asriel, as a boss monster, I am sure you are aware of your potential strength compared to other monsters. For you, it is not a matter of what your resonance happens to be, but about learning proper control with magic overall. At the end of the day, you are still a monster and all of that extra power inside of you could lead to some disastrous results if left unchecked.”

He then turned to my brother. “And as for you, Chara, I cannot say for certain what will be in store for you. As a human, your power may grow to be magnitudes greater than even a boss monster’s. That is something I’ve seen go very wrong many times. So, for the same reason as Asriel, this training is even more important for you. The problem with humans, though, is they vary in strength much more than monsters do, so a part of your training will be pinning down just how strong you are.

“However, I have some suspicions. Tell me, my dear. Were you born with those red eyes of yours?” My own eyes narrowed on Gerson. I thought the question strange. I had never seen Chara’s eyes any other color. How could he not be born with them? But, my brother shook his head in answer to the question and I looked to him in surprise. “I thought not,” Gerson went on, “which is already a sign that you are quite strong indeed. Maybe even the strongest human I’ve ever seen.

“‘The eyes are the widows to the soul’ as the human expression goes. And there’s a measure of truth to it. When humans wield a large amount of magical energy their eyes will change color to match that of their soul. Though, this is normally temporary. Asriel, you seem shocked to learn that Chara’s eyes weren’t always red. Have you never seen them any other color?” Shook my head and Gerson closed his eyes in thought. “Interesting…”

“So does that mean I can’t join?” Chara asked timidly.

Gerson seemed to retreat from his own mind and come back to reality. “Oh far from it, my dear. This training will be of more use to you than it will to anyone anyone else, I think.” The old turtle pulled his pipe from a pouch at his waist. The motion seemed habitual, because, as he was about to light it, he seemed to realize something and put the pipe back. “Only time will tell at this point. Moving on, I thinks it’s time I get an idea of what you know already. Let’s start with magic. Chara, would you like to go first?”

Chara shrunk into himself without answering. My brother had a problem using his magic with anyone else besides me or my parents around, after what happened the last time. Gerson put on a patient look and moved closer to him. “Do you know what your resonance is, by chance?” Chara nodded. “It’s okay to be scared of it if you cannot control it very well. That’s what you’re here to learn how to get past.”

“It’s not that,” I told him. “Chara is great at using magic. He’s just being shy.” I went over to my brother. “Come on, just show him something simple.” It took a moment, but he eventually stood up.

Chara stepped up to one of the racks of weapons along the wall. He picked up an axe, seemingly at random, and I saw a flash of light as he turned to face us. With a smirk, he lifted the axe over his head and all of the other weapons that lined the wall floated into the air with it, continuing up higher until they were almost to the ceiling. Then he let his arm fall, and the weapons fell back to into the racks just as they had been.

Gerson watched the whole thing intently, playing with the hair on his chin as he did. “I see,” he said, “so you have some telekinetic abilities?”

No,” I chimed in. “It’s not telekinesis, it’s bonding magic.”

Gerson’s eyes went wide. “I see… Is there anything else you can do with that spell, Chara?”

“Heck yeah!” I jumped in. “Chara can do lots of stuff, like walk on walls, and make things fly really fast, and break big rocks. But that’s not even the coolest thing. Chara can see magic!”

The old monster’s eyes narrowed again. “See magic? How does that work?”

I opened my mouth to answer, but I realized I didn’t know. I had never asked. We both looked to Chara, who stood slightly embarrassed by my little outburst a moment before.

My brother thought for a moment. “I don’t really know. It… it’s like a web; a bunch of thin threads all different colors woven together. I could see them ever since I fell down here. When Asriel first taught me about magic, I just started figuring out what all of the threads meant, what they did. It wasn’t that hard, really…”

The ancient warrior looked down at my brother consideringly. “You become more interesting with every moment, my dear.” He turned back to address both of us before going on. “Now, bonding magic is one with a very rocky history. There is very much that can be done with it; it has even been theorized that the spell has the potential to do anything imaginable. It has also been said that all magic is in some way a derivative of bonding magic. Of all of the magic that has come to be considered dangerous it is no stretch of the imagination to say that that is the worst of them. As such, I’m going to have to ask you to try not to use that magic unless directly told to do so from now on.”

Chara looked sad to hear that; his eyes dropped to the floor. I knew how much he loved the freedom that magic gave him, but I believed Gerson when he said it was dangerous. My mind went back to the book I had read and suddenly some of the things described in it seemed very dangerous indeed. Gerson went over to my brother and lifted his head before placing a hand on his shoulder. “Understand that this not because I do not trust you, my dear, but because I wouldn’t trust myself with such a power. I’m actually surprised the king and queen would let you go so long without saying as much themselves. Then again, they probably thought it was telekinesis too, if all you ever did with it was what Asriel described.”

The other monster turned back to me. “Asriel, how about you? What magic do you have for us today?”

Then, it was my turn to shrink in on myself. “I… I can’t do anything like that…” I mumbled.

“I would hope not.” Gerson commented. “If the two of you both had that resonance, my job would be difficult indeed.”

“I actually don’t know my resonance…” I added, even quieter than the first.

“Is that so? Well, that is no matter. I’m sure it will be fished out during your time here. Just show me what you can do.”

I sighed and sat back down on the ground. I held my hands out in front of me and formed a small flame over them. It was still about the only thing I could manage to do.

Gerson walked over to me and looked at the fire as if there was some trick to it he wasn’t getting. “Is that it?” he asked.

“Pretty much…” I told him.

The old monster shrugged. “I suppose magic is what you’re here to learn.”

“Guess this means I will always be able to beat you, huh Asriel.” My brother joked. I didn’t laugh. It wasn’t that I was envious of Chara’s strength; I just hated how weak I was.

Gerson turned back to Chara, saying “I would like to remind you, Chara, that just because you may be stronger by nature does not mean your victory is assured. Any monster with better control over what they can do will dance circles around you. So you better take this just as seriously as Asriel.”

My brother’s smile was wiped from his face, but his determination did not go with it. It seemed only to grow sharper.

“Alright, next on the agenda: do you two have any fighting experience? Shown the basics by your father perhaps?”

“No, but Chara and I pretend to fight a lot,” I told the old monster as I got back to my feet.

Gerson raised an amused eyebrow. “Oh, do you now?” He chuckled to himself. “Well, why don’t you each grab a practice weapon from the wall over there and show me what you can do.”

We both ran to the wall, smiling to ourselves and trying to beat the other to the racks of weapons. Finally, we were getting to the main reason we wanted to join in the first place. The practice weapons were nothing more than a bundle of reeds tied tightly together to be about as thick as my wrist and almost as long as I was tall. The ends were capped with what looked like wax and a bar made of stone near one end served as a guard, making the whole thing look almost like the sword it was supposed to be.

We ran back to the ring in the center of the room and stood a short distance apart from one another. Gerson moved to the edge of the stone outline and sat back down. “Whenever you’re ready,” he said with a wave of his hand, and we went at it, for all of about three seconds.

“Stop!” the old turtle shouted. “Why are you two standing like that?” he questioned.

My brother and I exchanged puzzled looks. When Gerson said go we had both taken the first stance we always took: Sword raised to our ears with our weight on our back leg. “It’s how all of the statues stand,” I explained, “We thought it was right.”

Gerson shook his head. “Artists don’t know the first thing about fighting. And I can guarantee not a single one of them ever met a monster worthy of being immortalized while they were actually holding a weapon.

“Stance and fighting style can vary, and there’s no way that is technically correct but, there are certain things that need to be taken into account regardless of how you fight. A sword should be held so that the arms are loose and in a way that one can move to block, parry, or strike in as many different ways as possible as fast as possible. The way you are now, you’re likely to chop your own head off before you can get any decent momentum behind your movements.”

Once we were certain that was all the old monster would say, Chara and I awkwardly adjusted ourselves. I moved my weapon down to my side, pointed at the ground, and Chara held his out in front of him. “Better,” Gerson commented. “Continue.”

Chara and I charged at each other with a loud cry, already with smiles back on our faces. We reached each other and our swords clashed before us- “Stop!”

My brother and I pulled apart and turned to Gerson once more. “Why are you moving so slowly? It’s like you’re fighting in some sort of syrup.”

“We were just-” I began to explain.

“I know exactly what you were doing.” Gerson interrupted. “You slow down your attack so the other person can react properly, like you’re putting on some sort of performance. May I remind you that we are not playing pretend here, kiddos. We’re learning how to actually fight and that means swinging to hit your opponent and end the fight, not let them fight back. Again!”

I swallowed. Chara looked to me, suddenly very reluctant, but we did as we were told and went at one another again. It was much more awkward than before. Neither of us wanted to get hit or really hit the other and so we would shrink away and pull back more often than we would actually fight, but clearly Gerson was not expecting the world from us so soon.

The monster was on his feet now. He was circling the ring as he watched us fight, but he said nothing unless it was to point out some new mistake we had made. “Ariel, you’re too close. Every time you go into your opponent’s reach you put yourself at risk. Only do so if you have already thrown your opponent off balance and given yourself an opening.” Or to go into detail about some aspect he felt we should pay more attention to. “This type of fighting is about rhythm, maintaining your own while disrupting your opponent’s. Chara, keep your feet apart!”

It went on like that for what felt like the whole day. Both Chara and I were getting tired by the time Gerson had seemed to be finished lecturing us. More than anything though, I was irritated by how everything had gone thus far.

It wouldn’t have been so frustrating if it wasn’t for the fact that I had actually thought I had been doing something right beforehand. I suppose that was my own fault, but that didn’t change anything. You know what it’s like as a kid, blaming everyone else just because something didn’t go as planned. Gerson was still circling around us as we fumbled blindly, but his eyes were closed now, likely trying to think of some other way we were wrong. That time, I decided to act on my frustration a little. Instead of swinging to hit Chara, I swung my fake sword at the old turtle. I had only intended to catch him by surprise, not to hurt him in any way, I didn’t think I could even if I tried. I just wanted to knock him down a peg. I accomplished neither.

The old warrior’s hand was at his side one moment, and the next it was wrapped around the weapon still a foot from the back of his head. He hadn’t even opened his eyes. “Good,” he said a moment later. “We can get this lesson out of the way early.”

The practice sword was half way across the room before I even realized it was out of my hands. And by the time I had registered that, I felt the world begin to spin. My feet were no longer on the ground, I gasped as the room was suddenly sideways. And in the time it took to blink I was shoved to the ground with an impact that made my head ring. Once the shock had passed I tried to move, but my arms and legs were pinned, my right arm was twisted painfully behind my back and it made me stop trying to struggle.

“Listen well, boys,” Gerson said above me, and it finally connected that he was the one pinning me down. “I am your teacher for a reason: I know what I am doing. I do not just sit and spout words that I think are the right way to do things, I say only what is true and what I have found to be true through firsthand experience. So, Asriel, if you ever are having anymore thoughts that I am somehow wasting your time, remember this moment.” Gerson got off of me after that and helped me to my feet. There was no malice in his expression; it was the same since we began, flat and calculating; a teacher teaching. He had not done that just because I had struck at him, and I understood that. If we were not taking the monster’s words to heart, we were only wasting our own time. And there was no point in getting angry over being wrong or being corrected. That’s why we were there: to learn. I nodded my understanding to the turtle and he smiled back at me, satisfied that his lesson had gotten across to his student.

“Now,” Gerson said, turning away from us. “I think I have a pretty good idea of where you two stand. So I suppose we can finally start.” I looked at the monster’s back in distress; I thought we were done. I was tired enough that I felt I could sleep for a week. The monster seemed to feel the look I was giving him. “After all,” he went on without turning. “It’s not even lunch time.”

 

That evening, while mom was in the kitchen cooking dinner and Chara was filling her in on everything we did that day, I was sitting at the dining room table across from my dad. A chess board sat between us. I enjoyed strategy games like that; it was the puzzle of it, trying to figure out the best course of action. Though, I had the habit of trying to play without either side losing pieces, which frustrated my father at times. I was only half paying attention to the game, however. I felt exhausted after everything that went on over the day.

“So, how did it go?” My father asked, moving a piece on the board; I barely registered the move. “Not at all what you expected was it?”

I groaned my fatigue as a response. After our testing, it had been nonstop work until dad had come to pick us up. Whether it be swinging a sword a thousand and one times in a row or trying to stay upright while Gerson tried to push us to the ground, or a dozen other things; it had been grueling.

“Remember, you can stop and wait until you’re older, if you’d like.” My dad told me. I shook my head.

For most of that first day, I had considered making it my last. I felt more and more defeated as the day went on, like I wasn’t going anywhere and never would. And Gerson’s reminders that none of it was supposed to be something that took a day to learn didn’t help. I had Chara to compare myself to as well. My brother seemed to pick up everything the old turtle told him in an instant. But what really had almost been the nail in my coffin were the other monsters.

Near the end of the day, I was practicing different strikes in front of a practice dummy. At that point, I could barely hold the sword without my arms shaking. I started to hear laughter behind me and turned to see some of the other monsters from before standing around the edge of the room. Undyne was at the forefront. “Who would have thought?” I picked up from one of them. “You’d think a boss monster would be more capable than that, even a kid.”

It was nothing new. I knew I was weak; that wasn’t what made me want to quit, it was them. I was some sort of outsider to them. I didn’t belong and I never would, and I didn’t understand. In their shoes, I would have been supportive of the newest arrival, encouraged them, helped them along; not see them as a waste with no hope of going forward, some weed to uproot before it became too big to deal with. That was why I wanted to leave: I wanted nothing to do with a place that fostered that kind of attitude in monsters.

Luckily, Gerson put a stop to it. “Hey!” he shouted at the group. “If you have energy to waste standing there then I guess Durga didn’t work you hard enough. Maybe I should give you all an extra lesson, huh?” All of the monsters but Undyne looked very scared by that thought, a few of them even shuffled uneasily. The blue scaled monster herself seemed excited by the idea. “I didn’t think so.” Gerson said without waiting for a vocal answer. “Now, git, before I remind you all just how little you know as well!” The group went at a run from the room until only Undyne remained. Gerson looked after the others as they disappeared down the hall. “That girl needs to do something about their damned arrogance…” I heard him mumble.

“When are you going to let them train with us, Mr. Gerson?” Undyne asked. She looked between Chara and me with the same almost manic eagerness I saw that morning. She also hardly looked like she had just spent the day doing much the same as the two of us.

“It’s only their first day, girl.” Gerson told her. “Give them time.”

“ _I_ was training with the others on my first day!” she protested.

“And you know precisely why that is, my dear. Now, be good and stay here a moment. I have some words I’d like to say to Miss Captain. I may end up in charge of this place again after all…”

When Gerson was out of the room, I dropped the sword and crashed my butt down onto the ground immediately, glad to finally get a break. Chara was still standing, eyeing Undyne suspiciously as the monster walked up to us.

“I thought you two would be tougher.” She said. It was not at all meant to insult, simply a statement of fact. The rail-thin fish monster barely came up to Chara’s chin. She had her bright red hair tied behind her head and it fell to just below her shoulders. She hardly looked like someone who could take down a monster twice her height. And yet, at the same time, she looked ready to flip me onto my back just like Gerson had earlier at a moment’s notice.

Chara shrugged at the monster’s comment. “Well, it is our first day.” He repeated.

“Even so, I was looking forward to testing myself against a boss monster and a human. No one else here can put up much of a fight. But it looks like both of you will need years to even catch up to me as well, so I guess there goes that plan.”

“Is that right?” Chara asked, the challenge clear in his voice.

Undyne spun to face him, getting right in his face as she did so. “You bet.” She told him. “I’m going to be the strongest of all the monsters!” She exclaimed. “Stronger than the king, stronger even than humans. Undyne, the True Hero of Monsters. That’s me. Then I can make this world better for all monsters, you’ll see.”

Before my brother could say anything more, Gerson popped his head back in the room. I stood back up reluctantly, not wanting to show that I had taken a rest without permission. “Darn woman already left.” He was grumbling to himself. He took in the scene before him. “Undyne, you’re not causing any trouble, are you?” The other monster stepped back from Chara and shook her head innocently. The old turtle looked like he didn’t buy it, but he let it lie. “Boys, that’s it for today. Your father’s waiting out front for you. Come on, Undyne, time for us to go home too.”

Undyne ran over to Gerson who put a hand on her shoulder as they turned to go. Before they vanished from the doorway, Undyne spun her head back to us and stuck her tongue out. Chara responded in much the same way.

It was then I that knew I couldn’t quit, I needed to grow stronger. With strength I could change the things I wanted to change. I never thanked Undyne for showing me that.

I looked to my brother and saw fierceness in his eyes that rivaled that of the other monster’s and I knew that he was not going to give up either.

Chara and mom came into the room a moment later carrying plates of food, the smell bringing me back to the present. “Chara tells me you had quite the tiring day.” My mom said as she put one of the plates in front of me. “Make sure you eat up and regain your strength.” I didn’t need to be told twice. I don’t think I ever ate as much as I did that night. I ate almost as much as a human.

That night, as tired as I was, I couldn’t sleep. I kept thinking about the training, what I learned, what I needed to remember, what I still had to get the hang of. I turned to my brother. He was staring at the ceiling, turning over in his hand the stone Gerson had given him in Waterfall what already felt like a lifetime ago. The color of the gem matched his eyes almost perfectly. I wondered what color his eyes had been before, whether he missed it and why he had never brought it up. My brother turned his head and caught me staring at him. “Can’t sleep either?” he asked.

I shook my head against the pillow. “Nope.”

Putting the stone in his pocket, Chara sat up in his bed. “It was a lot to take in, huh?”

“Yeah, feel like I already forgot half of it…”

“Really?” Chara asked. “There were parts I was trying to forget.”

“We can’t do that.” I reminded him. “Everything Gerson told us is important. We’ll get it all eventually. We just need to practice more.”

“You want to practice now?” He asked.

I sat up as well and looked at him questioningly. “Why? We’re probably just going to be doing the same thing tomorrow anyway. Besides, we should save our energy.”

“Why not though?” he countered. “We can’t sleep anyway, and the more we practice, the faster we’ll get better.”

Eventually I shrugged. “I guess you’re right.” We both got out of bed and ended up spending hours trying to fight each other with what we had learned that day.

                                                      

We had been right, the next day held much the same as the first, as did every day after for more than a month. Each day got a little easier and we learned a little more. We learned how to fight with everything, our hands, an assortment of weapons; it was a lot to take in so quickly, but we managed, somehow.

After the first week or so, magic became more of a focus as well. Chara was restricted to the basics of his bonding magic at first, until he could demonstrate a measure of control with it. I had felt he’d done so immediately, but Gerson wanted to be extra careful. Then he began to discover more and more of what he could with that power.

My time was spent trying to figure out what my resonance was. Being as weak in magic as I was, I never really used it all that much to be able to learn what mine was naturally like other monsters. I had no luck on that front, but, as it turns out, I would have better luck down a different avenue.

After it was clear we knew enough to fight without tripping over our own feet, Gerson showed us something new. “One of the things every monster in this program learns is what we’ve come to call enhancement magic.” He stated. “Simply put, it is magic that will make you faster, stronger and more reactive than you already are. It was a magic first discovered by the king and we immediately saw its usefulness. Normally, we tell monsters that it was a magic meant to combat humans, but that’s only half true. In actuality, it imitates certain natural functions of the human body such as adrenaline and other survival instincts. Monsters cannot strengthen their bodies to the same degree as humans through repeated exercise. We have no muscles to grow as we work them, and while the repetition is helpful for learning, this spell makes up for that lack of increasing physical ability because we _can_ become stronger in magic the more we use it. In theory, it is not that difficult to learn. In practice it may take you some time, so do not get frustrated if you cannot manage at first.”

The thought of such magic excited me. It was everything I had wanted, a way to get stronger, and quickly. It was safe to say I was eager to get started.

“Know that there is a danger to this magic.” Gerson went on. “It pushes aside things like fatigue and exhaustion. It is very easy to overdo it with this spell. You must always, _always_ be aware of the state you are in, and never use this ability if you are at all tired beforehand. Do you think you are ready?”

I nodded my head and the old turtle mirrored the motion. “Right then, for the first time, it will be a little bit different. Once you get the hang of it, though, you’ll be able to do it whenever you’d like, but for now try to relax and concentrate.” I took a deep breath and tried to wash the fatigue from my body. “Close your eyes and clear your mind. Focus on your body, become aware of it as a whole.” Gerson’s voice faded to some unknown corner of my mind as I entered a trance-like state. I could still here him; it was just as if it were a voice in a dream. I understood without really hearing the words. “Now, think about that which motivates you. Think about what gives you the drive push yourself above and beyond what is thought to be possible. Hold to that thought, let it fill you, and concentrate on how it makes you feel.”

An image of Chara floated through my mind’s eye, sitting on the floor of our room and drawing, standing up for me with those kids in the alley, training here. I thought about how strong he was, about how he had protected me, and about how I wanted to protect him.

I began to get a feeling that quickly spread throughout my whole body. You probably know the feeling. It starts with excitement in the pit of your gut and fills you to the tip of every finger and toe until you feel like you’re going to burst from giddiness. And if you keep focusing on whatever made you feel like that the desire to do something becomes a need and sitting idle is no longer an option. If you haven’t ever felt like that, then I feel sorry for you.

“Now, feed that feeling with magic like you would a fire and try to connect it to your body.” The old turtle’s voice still floated in a place I couldn’t describe, but I understood. I reached out to the magic around me as I had been taught – that act alone was still difficult, but somehow it came much easier than it ever had before – and I drew it in to me. I let it swirl with the thought of me one day becoming as strong as my dad and not only being able to protect Chara, but everyone. Then, as if it had a will of its own, the spell seemed to crash into me and my eyes snapped open, but the feeling stayed.

My eyes continued to widen in disbelief. I felt… powerful, like all of the locks on my person had finally been opened. I looked down at my hands, expecting them to be different. But I was still the same. “Do you think you have it?” Gerson asked, standing above me. I nodded slowly without looking up at him, still not quite sure what _it_ was, but this must have been what the old monster was talking about, what else could it be? “Well, let’s test it then.”

My head shot up at Gerson’s words. I had known the turtle long enough at that point to know that could only mean one thing. Sure enough, the monster was swinging his walking stick at my head. But it was strange; he seemed to be moving slower than normal, much slower. Nonetheless, I wasn’t about to wait there for the gnarled branch to whack me in the head while I thought about it. I rolled onto my back just as the stick swept through the space where my head was. I raised my legs and kicked the improvised weapon out of the other monster’s hand and then threw my momentum into a flip, springing up off my hands to land on my feet. I hadn’t even realized I’d done it until I was staring at the monster again, ready for whatever follow-up attack he had ready. But the old turtle was only smiling at me with pride.

“You see, Asriel,” he said to me. “I told you we only had to find what worked for you and then you would see just how gifted you are.” I relaxed slightly, though I still felt like I wanted to run around the whole city. And that I could do it too. Gerson stepped up to me. “Now that you understand how to perform the magic and how it works, it is important that you know how to let it go.”

“But I don’t want to let it go.” I said in my excitement and Gerson’s expression turned sour.

“Remember what I said, boy. This magic is dangerous. You cannot use it all of the time. You’ll drain yourself dry before you even know it. Also, your body needs to learn how to take hold of it instinctually as the need arises. So, do not hold it, unless I tell you to. And don’t think I won’t know.” As much as I didn’t like it, I nodded my promise. “Now, it is simple. Just let yourself relax.”

I took another deep breath and did just that and the torrent of energy that seemed to fill me left in a flood. For a moment, I felt like I was falling and then the world was how I remembered it from a few minutes ago. It seemed dull in comparison; it was like I had never truly been alive before using that magic.

Gerson must have seen my expression because he put a hand on my shoulder. “The most important think about this power is self-control. I understand that it is difficult, but it’s better than being dead.” He looked behind himself. “Looks like Chara isn’t having such an easy time with it himself.”

I looked over to my brother and sighed. His back was to us, but I could see him twitching his leg impatiently and knew precisely what it meant. Going over to him, I saw that his eyes weren’t even closed any more. He was looking at the floor, frustrated and bored. “It didn’t work.” He said as I sat in front of him.

“So try again.” I told him.

“I did, it didn’t work.”

“To be honest, Chara, I wasn’t sure if this magic would work for you at all.” Gerson said as he joined us. “As I mentioned, this magic is meant to emulate humans. In a way, you already do what this spell does naturally. In other such instances, this usually causes magic to fail. For instance, you cannot make a rock where there is already a rock.” Chara grumbled and Gerson put a hand on his head. Chara shrunk away from it, but I don’t think the monster noticed. “Don’t be upset, we’ll try again tomorrow. For now, it is time to move on. Asriel, let’s see what you can do with your new skill.”

 

It was strange, at first, being able to keep up with my brother. The enhancement magic put us on near-to even footing when otherwise fighting without magic. We could go against each other the full day once I got the hang of it, which took little more than an hour, really. At the end of the day, I would let go of my newfound strength and no longer feel sad because of how much I was able to do now. I was tried, but no more tired than if I had only worked for the morning, and it got less and less as the days went by and my strength in magic improved.

Chara had actually managed to gain a slight handle on it himself after watching me do it a few times, but it required a heavy amount of concentration for him and would never be useful in a fight.

Most other magic escaped me still, to the point where Gerson was beginning to believe the enhancement magic may have been resonance. Apparently it was Undyne’s as well, and that was what let her jump forward in the training at such a young age.

Undyne had developed a habit of dropping in on us when we trained. Seeing that we had managed to improve so quickly reignited her hope. She would constantly challenge us; trying to get us to fight her so she could prove she was the strongest. Chara ignored her for the most part. I tried to be nice and say no, not without the okay from one of the instructors, but that only seemed to get her to try to rile me up even more.

Eventually, we were handed over Durga and began training with the other monsters as well. Though, Gerson still kept a sharp eye on us in the event something out of the ordinary occurred, according to him. Durga would often look at the old warrior warily, and if anything she became more intense than when I had first met her.

We were still outcasts among the other monsters, as much as I tried to remedy that. They weren’t unkind, just wary and that kept them at arm’s length for the most part.

About a week after joining the others, I learned just how far ahead of the curve we were. Our private training had done more work than I had thought. I had only ever fought against Chara so I had thought at best I was simply average for how long we had been training. My first fight against another monster proved me wrong.

Compared to Chara, the monster’s moments were sluggish; there was no power behind their strikes and they seemed to tire in minutes even with the enhancement magic. With the quarterstaff I held in my hands, I knocked them flat in less than five minutes. The second fight lasted fifteen seconds. After that I decided to change tactics. It was time to start trying to change things around there.

I became a teacher in my own right. I never went for the quick finish; I would let the fights drag on, never striking them unless it was part of my lesson. I would encourage them; give them suggestions on how to improve. I was trying to form some kind of friendship with the others, but most of them didn’t like that. Looking back, they probably thought I was mocking them. Durga hated it more than anyone. “Asriel!” she would shout. “You’ve missed six opportunities to take down your opponent. This is a fight, and that means you have to hit people, as much as you seem to not like to.”

I disagreed with our captain. There was more to fighting than just ending it quickly. There was much to be gained from it for both parties. You gained a certain understanding of the person you fought, their motivations, their fears. Plus, as the prince it was my job to help monsters improve themselves. Most still thought I was only toying with them.

There was one, though, who seemed to actually understand what I was trying to do and I looked forward to fighting him more than most. His name was Karim. A dragon monster like Durga, he had been in the training for more than three years already. He had already been named to have completed the training but had declined to leave after I had fought him the first time, saying I helped him realize he still had much to learn before he could be done.

He was definitely better than most. He was the only monster there that I actually had to hold my ground against. Our bouts would sometimes stretch on for an hour or more before one of us would admit defeat. We would even gain an audience at times. I would say I learned more from Karim than he had learned from me. He showed me fighting techniques I had never even thought of. Also, like me, he seemed less concerned with ending the fight than actually fighting. Because of him I learned how to fight like Chara and I used to on our own playing pretend, but make it look like we were fighting for real. It became more like a strategy game. I started to truly enjoy the training after that. Karim and I became good friends as well.

Chara became the only one I would fight with any level of seriousness, the few times we actually got to fight anymore. There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that the three strongest was Chara, Undyne, and I. And we were kept at a distance from each other in training because of that. Apparently to avoid collateral damage.

Chara had improved greatly himself and had quickly become Durga’s favorite. More often than not he was put up against two or three monsters at once and would end the fight without exhausting any effort at all. It was the only reason we were allowed to fight at all really, to give Chara some form of actual exercise.

Chara acted differently when we fought compared to when he fought everyone else. It was the only time he seemed to be… conscious. With the other monsters he always seemed like he was turning a part of himself off to fight. I asked him about it once on our way home.

My dad had stopped coming to get us after a few weeks. The Royal Scientist had finished building the massive devise that now sat below the city, what he had simply dubbed The Core. Apparently, it was a giant generator for magical energy that converted it to a type of electricity that humans used to power all sorts of things on the surface. The technology had quickly been incorporated throughout New Home, though monsters had questioned the use of it at first. None of it could do anything that magic could not, so what was the point? Eventually, though, fascination overpowered anything else and now there were electric lights on almost every building and in almost every home as well as other marvels that were too numerous to list like boxes that could heat food without flame.

What I enjoyed more than anything, though, was the network of elevators that now wove its way through the city, allowing one to go almost anywhere much faster than on foot. There were even some elevators being built into the castle. And as Chara and I were arriving home in one of them, I finally found my opportunity and asked him, “Why do you always fight everyone else so differently?”

“What do you mean?” He said, a little too innocently.

“You don’t seem like you.” I explained. “Or, rather, you don’t seem like you’re all there.”

My brother shrugged. “I guess because I’m bored.” He told me. “I don’t want to fight with them. I just want to train with you. I liked it better when it was just the two of us.”

I accepted the explanation, as it made sense. I would probably have been bored if I fought the way he did too. I had suggested that he try what I always did and help the others get better, but he didn’t seem interested in the idea. It seemed his plan was to beat enough monsters that they realized I was the only one he could actually fight, but that never happened. To make up for it, I would often fight with Chara in one of the closed off parts of the castle where hopefully mom wouldn’t catch us. Unfortunately my dad did catch us, but he didn’t seem mad, he even started joining us, after a while. Chara and I ended up ganging up on him more often than not. I like to think we threw him for a loop once or twice, but he was probably faking it.

Training went on like that for a while. Lessons and drills became less frequent and sparring became a greater focus. I had fought with everyone there dozens of times aside from Undyne, who I had yet to fight even once for whatever reason.

Almost every monster, at some point or another, tended to gain a tendency toward a certain type of weapon that they go forward with to the end. Chara had taken a preference to knifes and daggers of all sorts. I myself had yet to fall towards any one thing, I didn’t hate any of them, but I didn’t really particularly like any of them either. After all, they were weapons, in the end.

Then, learning magic turned into what we spent most of the day on, or trying to learn magic in my case. Gerson and Durga always had something new for me to try every day, but I showed little to no resonance with any of them. Eventually, they gave up and I spent the rest of the day fighting with Karim.

All in all, though, I thought everything was going great. The first sign that everything was not going great came from Karim, of all places. We were in the mess, taking a break after one of our longer sparing matches. I could tell that through most of it his mind had been elsewhere. And as we sat down to eat I finally got the chance to ask him.

“There’s something off about your brother.” He told me and I froze mid bite. That was the last thing I would have expected to come from him. Out of everyone he had been the most excepting of Chara, I had even thought they had become friends themselves.

I chuckled to myself before I continued eating. “And?” I said dismissively. “He’s a human. You learn pretty quickly that they’re a little weird.”

The other monster shook his head. “It has nothing to do with that. You haven’t noticed the way he’s been sparring with some of the others? Anyone who’s ever talked behind your backs about either of you, anyone who gets a little too close to you, they’ve all come out of a fight with some sort of injury as of late. Nothing major, but more than they should have gotten if you look close enough. Accidents, every one, according to Durga, but I’m not too sure.”

I still didn’t take any of it seriously. “Like I said he’s a human and a strong one too. According to Gerson, he has an affinity to magic stronger than a monster’s. I’m sure he didn’t mean anything by any of it. Chara isn’t the type of person to hurt anyone on purpose.”

Karim snorted. A puff of steam escaped his nose as he did. “Asriel, can you really be that blind to this? I thought maybe you were just keeping it all to yourself, but…” The monster was becoming frustrated and it reflected in his voice. “Almost everyone is too scared to fight him now. It’s the only reason why the captain let him start sparring with you again. You were the only option left.”

I shrugged. “I think you’re just making connects that aren’t there.” And yet, I felt like I was forgetting something.

“It’s more than that.” He told me. “When I started hearing people talk about what was going on, I had to make sure for myself. I sparred with him a few days ago. Thanks to you, I was able to catch him off guard and take him down before anything happened. It was so easy I thought everyone was making up stories too. But that look in his eyes as I stood over him… It still makes me shake. He looked angrier than I could even describe, Asriel.

“And before you dismiss me again, there’s more.” He went on. “That night as I was getting ready to leave he came up to me and told me to leave you alone. He threatened me, Asriel.”

I sat there and said nothing. I wasn’t sure what I could say. A part of me didn’t believe a word of it, but another part was beginning to put the pieces together and the parts were fighting back and forth in my head with no clear winner in sight. It was giving me a headache. It must have been a long silence, because the next thing I knew Karim was getting up from the table.

“Never mind.” He said.

“Where are you going?”

“I can see that nothing I say will make you believe me. You’ll just have to find out yourself. Be careful, Asriel.” He turned his back to me and walked away.

It was enough to plant the seed in my head. I kept catching myself looking for signs of Karim’s truth without finding anything. Karim began avoiding me without making it look to obvious. I probably wouldn’t have noticed if he had not said anything beforehand.

The only truth to what he had said though was that the others seemed to be avoiding him. Everyone but Undyne, whose attempts to intimidate only grew overtime and if anything, Chara seemed to egg her on now more than try to scare her away. Plus all of the other monsters were avoiding me as well unless we were forced to practice together. It was nothing different than it was in the beginning. But… he had been right. And the day I realized it is still fresh in my mind, because it changed everything.

 

There was a test every monster had to go through at some point in their training to see if you were ready to start incorporating your magic into fighting. The test was simple: a fight against monsters who were allowed to use magic while we could not outside of the enhancement spells which we had been training with for months. Chara and I were deemed ready at the same time so we would fight at the same time. There were only two monsters in the program at that point who were allowed to use magic that could put up any sort of fight against us. And, of course, it was Undyne and Karim. They were to be our opponents in a two-on-two match overseen by Durga, Gerson, and my father.

Undyne looked eager; this was the first time she’d finally gotten the opportunity she had been denied for months. Karim looked different than I ever seen him. He looked like he wanted to end this as fast as possible. As we stood across from one another he almost seemed to say, “I’m sorry.”

My father stood up and gave a short speech before the fight began. Every monster was gathered around the center ring in the courtyard. I wasn’t paying attention to what my dad said. I was looking at Chara. He looked almost as intense as Undyne, but unlike the monster, my brother did not look eager. I nudged him on the shoulder and he seemed to snap out of a trance. I smiled at him and he smiled back, but his look immediately returned when he turned away from me.

“Are the combatants ready?” My dad said. Karim and Undyne readied themselves. Undyne spun a blunted spear behind herself. Karim held a halberd out in front of him. Next to me, Chara unsheathed his knives in a flourish. I was unarmed. I had been advised against doing that several times, but I had a point to prove. We wore only light armor, chain mail shirts, bracers, greaves, enough to hopefully stop us from being seriously injured. My father looked to all of us and nodded. “Then let us begin.”

A bell sounded. Undyne was before me an instant later. I had watched her fights every now and then, so I had a good idea what she was capable of. But watching and actually facing her were two completely different things. She was fast, faster than anyone I had fought before. Guess that was an advantage to having enhancement magic be your resonance.

She swung her spear at my head and I ducked, dropping all the way down to the ground. Catching my weight on my arm, I swung out my leg to try to trip the other monster, but she seemed to see it coming and bounded back. In the moment of respite, as I sprung back to my feet, I looked over to Chara. My brother stood at the opposite side of the square, blocked off from me by Karim. So that was their plan, keep us separated and play to an advantage of a bad pairing. But, Chara and I had planned for that. There was just one thing to do first.

Undyne came at me again, her spear held out in front of her. That time I sidestepped the attack and then I hit the spear with my knee with the intent to drive it into the ground and catch her off balance. But Undyne was too good to be tripped up by that. She pulled her weapon back so she gripped it just behind the foot-long blade which she swung at my chest as she spun past me. I leaned back to dodge; Undyne swung her spear around her whole body until she had it in a normal hold again and I suddenly found my well into her reach. I tried to jump back, but I was too slow. There was no way for me to dodge the swing aimed for my side and I was forced to block. The swing hit hard enough that I thought it would tear my arm off. It was strong enough to almost send me spinning. But I pushed the pain aside and quickly regained my balance.

A wash of heat behind me told me how Chara’s fight was going and I smiled. He was doing his part well if he had gotten Karim to use magic. Now it was my turn.

Undyne’s fighting style all attack; attack and then attack again as soon as you’re able. It would have been easy to deal with if it weren’t for the fact that she was so erratic. She seemed to never strike the same way more than once, forcing me to dodge then block, dodge and then block; each impact jarring my body with the sheer strength of the blow. I needed to end this quick.

“Would have figured, with all of your talk, that you would have had more to show for it than this.” I saw frustration gloss her face for a moment before it was back to the crazed eagerness it was before.

“Says the one who’s been on the defense this whole time.” She countered.

I smirked. “Only because I choose to be.”

I was before her an instant later, my fist swinging for her head. Her spear moved to counter but I batted it away with my other arm. Before she could dodge, I pulled the punch back and spun to kick her square in the chest and she slid back several feet with a grunt. “Come on,” I said while she tried to recollect herself. “I thought you said you were stronger than anyone. But you don’t seem all that much to me.”

Undyne was getting angry now. That was good; all according to plan. The monster leapt forward and I jumped back making sure to never look away from her and keep up the cocky smile I had on my face. She leapt again and I dodged back once more. Before I knew it, my brother was behind me. We had somehow managed to time it all perfectly. Our opponents looked shocked as they realized their plan to separate us had failed.

“You were right,” Chara told me.

I smiled to myself. “I know Karim. And I know Undyne enough to know she’d respect his plans.

“You sure you don’t want to borrow one of these?” Chara asked, meaning his knives. “I saw you take a hit or two back there.”

“No thanks. I still have a point to prove.” I told him.

“You and your pacifism.”

“I already told you, that’s not what that word means. I just don’t like weapons.” Our opponents were standing back, waiting for us to make the first move. “Do you want to switch? Karim might still be too tricky for you after a while.”

“I think I have a handle on him. Let’s stick to the plan.”

“If you say so.”

I launched myself at Undyne, back on the attack, and she charged at me as well. We b-lined it towards each other, daring the other to dodge out of the way. I knew Undyne would not, but she was wrong to assume I wouldn’t as well. After all, it wasn’t just me she was fighting.

I sidestepped just as we were about to crash into each other and the other monster flew past me. My brother, who had done similar with Karim, jumped aside as well and the two monsters were suddenly charging at each other. They managed to pull short, but we did not give them a chance to recover. Chara and I went in and unleashed strike after strike, circling them so that we were not battling one or the other for more than a few seconds, all in an attempt to tire them out and play to the one real advantage we had against them: stamina. They would tire out long before either of us, it was inevitable.

There was only one thing the plan didn’t account for: Karim’s fire magic, which he had never been allowed to use in our fights before. Now our opponents were allowed to use magic against us in a restricted sense. For example, they could not use magic that could only be countered with magic, like Chara’s bonding magic, if the roles were reversed. Undyne was untrained in any spells aside from her resonance, as far as I knew. But, knowing Karim, he probably had a trick or two up his sleeve. The best thing we could do with that lack of information was to keep him preoccupied and unable to use it.

Unfortunately, that plan proved ineffective. A vortex of fire rising around them showed us that Karim wouldn’t let a little pressure stop him. The spell broke our engagement and pushed us back. The two monsters leapt at us before the flames even began to die out and we were on even footing once more, pushing back and forth for dominance in the fight.

Chara and I fought like a cohesive unit; knowing what the other would do before we did it and complimenting the motion. All thanks to the extra training we had done with my dad. Undyne and Karim were not so organized. They kept a distance between them to not interfere with one another and we played heavily on that disadvantage.

Undyne was the stronger of the two, but she was still less experienced. Chara and I shifted out strategy without needing to say a word to one another, so that for every blow that was struck at Karim, two was struck at Undyne, and it did not take long for her to begin to tire out. More openings presented themselves, and we hammered at her defense until it finally fell. I swung my leg in a round house kick to the monster’s head and she dropped and she did not get up.

Karim saw his partner fall and broke off. For a moment, I thought he would try to keep going. He readied his weapon out in front of him, and Chara and I readied ourselves in response. But that seemed to be the end of it after all.

I watched Karim relax. I could tell he was done, that he had had enough. But, as he raised his hand to announce his surrender, Chara suddenly charged at him and drove his knife into Karim’s chest with enough force to pierce his chain mail. I watched the monster’s eyes go wide, his face contorting into mixture of pain, confusion and shock. He collapsed to the ground a moment later.

Everything after that happened in an instant, but it felt like years. Noise exploded around me, the other monsters were all screaming, screaming for help, screaming at Chara, I didn’t know. It was in another place for me, another world. I watched Chara standing over Karim’s unconscious form. He looked down on the monster expressionless, his eyes cold. In my mind, I was spinning. I couldn’t understand what had happened. Did Chara not see he was giving up? Was it an accident?

I watched Chara raise his knife over my friend again and my body finally caught up to my mind. “Chara!” I screamed. And, once more, as if coming out of a trace, my brother seemed to snap back to life. He looked at the knife in his hand curiously, as if not quite understanding how it got there. Then he looked down at Karim and his eyes went wide. He dropped the blade and put his hands to his mouth as he tried to shrink away from the unconscious monster. Tears were already streaming down his face.

I was to him in a blink grabbing him and trying to ask him what had happened. Chara’s face was a mixture of horror and confusion. He said nothing. When he realized it was me holding him, he seemed to be trying to pull me closer and push me away at the same time.

In the time all of this happened, Durga had reached Karim and was holding a hand over his chest after ripping the ruined mail away. Light streamed from the wound in the monster’s chest. I turned Chara away from it. Karim was still in one piece, which was a good sign, and Durga must know at least some healing magic if I knew what she was doing. Most of the others still stood in shock, some of them cried wordless cries that my ears refused to take in. Instead they focused on one voice, closer than the others, still in the ring with us.

I turned my head to it and saw Undyne charging at me, a look of pure rage twisting her features. She held her spear out to strike at me. No, not at me, at Chara. I moved to block my brother, but Undyne did not stop, she kept on, her fury blinding her to the fact that I was even there. The blade was less than a foot from me when I realized that I was going to be killed. I was afraid, but I did not move. I had to protect Chara. Instead, I shut my eyes to the inevitable and waited for the pain that would announce my end. But still, I hoped against hope that something would happen. I hoped that spear would somehow disappear before it struck. My fear mixed with that image in a way I could not describe and I felt a wave of energy escape me. I paid it no mind, knowing it would make little difference in a moment. But, the moment stretched, and I began to wonder what was wrong.

I opened my eyes to find Undyne standing no closer than she had when I shut them. She was no longer look at me, looking at Chara, she was looking at her hands, her empty hands. A line of dust lay next to her feet. Broken where she had held it when it was still a spear and slightly dispersed from the fall to the earth. My look of disbelief must have matched her own when I put two and two together.

Then, Gerson appeared behind Undyne and pulled her away. She snapped out of her daze and started to struggle against the old turtle’s grip. The rage was back in her eyes. My dad was between us a second later. He knelt down and put a hand on both my brother and I. I was worried he’d be mad, but he looked just as scared as I felt and concerned as well. “Come,” he said. “Let’s go somewhere else and sort this out.” I was amazed by how calm he sounded.

I let myself be pushed out of the courtyard and away from the other monsters. We went to a room deep into the compound. An office of some kind, but I wasn’t really being observant. My dad sat us down in a chair and knelt down again. “What happened, Chara?” My dad asked as he turned to face him. His voice was still all calm; there was no accusation, nothing.

Chara struggled for a moment to remember how to speak. His eyes were still wide with shock. “I… I don’t know… It was an accident! I-I panicked, I…” Chara stammered, and then he asked. “Did… did I kill him?” His voice shook with fear as the possibility was given voice. I wanted to wrap my arms around my brother and tell him everything would be okay, but I didn’t know if it would. Instead, I looked to my father.

He was silent for a moment and then let out a breath. “I don’t think so. The mail might have saved him yet.”

“I… I didn’t mean to… I didn’t want to…” My dad put a hand on my brother’s head to quiet him.

Of course, I thought, what else could it have been but an accident? And yet, my mind went back to the look in Chara’s eyes, cold and emotionless. That was not the look someone making a mistake in a panic. It was one of a calculated decision going exactly as expected. But, the way Chara looked now, I almost doubted the image I had in my head, dismissed it as impossible. But I could not force it away completely. It lingered. Before we left my dad went to go talk to someone, I barely paid any attention to what he said. I kept playing it all over in my mind. There was something missing and I felt like I didn’t have all of the pieces to put it together.

My brother was silent to the point where I had thought the hush had taken him. But when I looked, he still stared straight ahead. Frozen, but still there. I put a hand on his shoulder and he flinched away from it. He had not done that with me in a long time. “It’s okay, Chara.” I told him, trying to sound less shaken up than I felt. “I know you didn’t want to hurt him.”

Only silence met me in response.

 

Karim was fine, and it was the only reason that was the end of the matter. It was all written off as an accident and, officially, everyone moved on. Chara was still silent on the way home, distant, and understandably so. There was something he wasn’t telling me, I had realized, and I had a strong suspicion it was the piece I was missing to this whole puzzle. Maybe, I’m putting too much into it now, but I remember thinking at the time that it somehow had something to do with all of missing pieces and inconsistencies in my brother since we met. But, surely if I had thought that back then, I wouldn’t have let things get that far, right? So maybe I’m wrong. Still, I knew then Chara was keeping something from me. I didn’t bring it up with my dad there. I could tell he wanted to forget about all of this already. And in a way, I did too. But I couldn’t let it rest. Not now; not after everything.

When we got home, we went to our room to wait for dinner. Nobody told my mom what happened though she must have felt everyone’s mood. Perhaps she just thought we were tired or that we didn’t pass the test. We would have to tell her eventually, though.

I pulled Chara to me before he could sit down on his bed. “Chara, I-” I began.

“You found your resonance magic.” He interrupted. “I saw. I could tell. I’m glad.”

“Chara…”

“I’m really tired, Asriel.” He struggled to escape my grip. “I think I’m gonna take a nap before we eat.”

“Chara, stop!” I yelled and he stiffened. “What are you not telling me? What really happened during that fight?” I got right to the heart of the matter. If I didn’t, he’d find a way to wiggle himself out of it. “Chara, I was watching the whole time. That didn’t look like an accident. It looked like you meant to hurt Karim. Why?” My brother said nothing, he looked between his feet. “Chara, tell me why! Or tell me I’m wrong. Just say something!”

“I don’t think I want to do the training anymore. It’s not as fun as I thought.” Chara smiled up at me with that smile that was full of pain.

“Why?” I pleaded. “What happened? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you as happy as when we’re training. What changed? What made you do that?”

Chara shook his head. “You don’t understand.”

“Because you won’t tell me!”

“Because you can’t understand!” Chara shouted. I took a step back. I still remembered that look in his eyes well. The cornered animal ready to fight desperately for his life. “Have you ever looked in a mirror and hated the face that stared back?” He said. “Have you ever hated something about yourself to the point of wanting to physically cut it out of you?”

I was shocked. I had done it; I had broken down all of Chara’s walls and found what was on the other side: the root of his pain. A pain I knew all too well. “Yes,” I said, my voice shaking. “You don’t know the number of times I wished I wasn’t a boss monster. Always being held to this standard of greatness yet being so week… It’s like the only thing I see on people’s faces at times is disappointment. ‘This runt will be our next king? I weep for our future then.’ But you changed that, Chara. You saw me for me, and that’s the reason I keep going. It’s the reason I kept trying to get stronger.”

It was Chara’s turn to look shocked then. Maybe he really didn’t expect me to understand. Then, he seemed to smile at the irony. “You know, I envy you, Asriel. Whenever monsters compare you to dad, you look proud. Before I came here, I was always compared to my father whenever I was with someone else. ‘You act just like him,’ or ‘you have your father’s face.’ I didn’t know what they meant. I barely ever saw my father. Almost every night a monster would walk into the house wearing my father’s skin. Not a monster like you, an evil one; one of the ones from the stories that hide under you bed or in your closet until you fall asleep so they can steal you away to a world of nightmares. But this monster didn’t wait until I was asleep. It brought the nightmare to the waking world with it. It screamed and roared … and it hit me.” Chara trailed off, his shoulders were shaking.

“Chara…” I tried, reaching out to him, but he turned to me before I touched him. His eyes were dry and they looked dead.

“I don’t want to hurt people, Asriel. But sometimes I don’t know how not to. Like those kids in the city. If it weren’t for you, if it weren’t for what you showed me, I would have… I…” He ran into my arms, tears streaming down his face for sure now. “I don’t want to be like my father. I want to be like you, Asriel. But some people, some people are just cruel, sometimes without even realizing the damage they do. And I hate them. I hate them to the point where I want them to just… go away. I want to let it go, but I just can’t. And it builds and builds until I feel like I’m going to break. And I’ll do anything, _anything_ , just to make it stop.”

“If you were afraid of that, then why did you want to join the training?”

Chara pulled away and turned his back to me. He wiped his face. “I had known about the training before we talked about it up on the wall that day. I had asked your dad about what was and what it was for. He told me about how it taught dangerous people to control themselves. I thought it would help me find an answer. After what happened in Home, I was scared of what my power could do. I thought I wanted to learn how to defend myself without having to hurt people. But now, I don’t know what I really wanted. Maybe be I really am a monster like my dad…”

“No!” I shouted and Chara turned to me in shock. I had stunned myself with how fiercely I had said it, but it was how I felt. “You are nothing like that, Chara.” I went on. “You care about people, you care about me, and you care about mom and dad. It’s not you that’s wrong, it’s not you that needs to change, it’s them.”

“Asriel…” I threw my arms around my brother again.

“You’re a good person Chara. I love you, and nothing will ever change that. And I’m sorry, for forcing you to do all of those things that you probably didn’t want to do. I wish you had told me all of this sooner. But you are a good person, and I promise I will do everything I can to make sure everyone else sees that. I’ll everything to make people see the damage they do without realizing, so you can be happy and never have to be scared of yourself again.”

After a stunned moment Chara wrapped his arms around me as well. I could feel him crying into my shirt. “Thank you, Asriel.” He whispered.

We stayed like that for a long time; until Chara’s tears stopped he lifted his head to smile up at me. For the first time that I remember, the pain in his eyes was gone. Chara looked at peace for the first time in his life. “Come on,” I told him. “Let’s get stronger together. And let’s change the world.”


	6. The First Mistake

Chara was a victim of abuse. His real father was a drunk, a mess, and had a high amount of discontent with the world and his place in it. And like any other weak-willed, pathetic excuse of an individual, he took his pain out on those around him.

It all started with his mother who, to me at least, it seemed like she had her own set of problems. Chara's mother apparently used to swear up and down that his father used to be different, and that eventually – once he was able to finally get a new job, once he was finally able to get that raise, or once they were finally able to move to a nicer neighborhood, or pay off the bills – he would stop being so angry. I had my doubts long before my brother's story was done.

By the time Chara became old enough to talk, his father's attentions chose a different target and my brother soon learned the depths of the hell he was unfortunate enough to be born into. He was hit, he was whipped, he had bottles thrown at him…

Chara showed me his back, I hadn't known what a scar was before then, but his back was more that than anything. My brother was very… articulate in his description of those days; the pain, the fear, the desperation. I wanted him to be lying, I wanted it all to be some kind of joke, but it was the truth; the truth you don't want to hear. I remember telling my brother to stop, that it was enough, but he had to keep going; he had to let it all out.

This went on for years. Chara's only solace was the times when his father was at work and their house was quiet at last. My brother relished silence; it meant that for a few hours he could live his life like any other kid. But he always feared the hour that monster, that _actual_ monster, would walk through their front door. And the hell would resume.

School was little better. Problems misbehaving, not getting work done; which, of course, only made things even worse at home. That's when it started. Chara's school apparently thought they had an idea of what was going on in Chara's life. They pulled him aside and he told them everything. Then they brought his parents in and they both swore up and down that it was all a lie, telling the school that Chara was always a liar and would act out to get attention. The school believed his parents. Can you believe that?

After that, Chara just stopped. He stopped trying to resist, stopped trying to pretend it would get better. He accepted his reality in silence. That didn't help matters either; his father only tried harder to get some sort of reaction out of him.

Chara's mother grew to hate her son. In some twisted way she became jealous that Chara was getting so much attention from her husband, and then she began to hit him as well. Then, there was not a single moment in that house when he felt safe.

My brother started to run away after that. At first, he tried to get help, but after what happened at the school no one believed him. They all took the word of his parents over his and thought that everything was fine and that Chara was just acting like a child. It's no wonder he hates humans.

Eventually, Chara's father got sick of him running away. He decided one night to scare him enough that he would never try to run away again. In an effort to save his own life, Chara grabbed a knife to defend himself, but he didn't have to.

On that same night, Chara's mother had decided that her husband had crossed the line one too many times, and she killed him before he could lay a hand on Chara. That was hardly the end of it.

They were taken to a shelter, and for a while Chara thought things would get better, but it only got worse. His mother grew to hate him even more, blaming Chara for the fact that their lives were destroyed. The people who worked as the shelter were almost as bad as his father. They force fed him medicine that made him feel like he was dead, or close enough to it that he wanted to finish the job.

He tried to escape that place three times. He would never tell me what happened after the first two. I don't think I want to know, even now, even like this. The third time he made it to the mountains before they had caught onto his trail. He was backed into a corner and faced with a choice, jump or go back to that hell. He chose to jump, and he ended up here.

All of this came spilling out of my brother that night. I listened to all of it while I held my brother close and he told me in a shaky voice the atrocious tale of his life. Out of everything I had imagined the reality was magnitudes worse, but I was naïve back then; I didn't know the true horrors this world could spit out. I was sheltered from them. And so I sat there on my bed, tears streaming down my face as my brother told his story and I thought about all of the things I had done wrong in my ignorance, thinking I was helping him.

I spent half that night crying myself, whispering how sorry I was under my breath. Once my brother was done he looked like he had cried so much that he could never cry again for as long as he lived.

Chara hates the fact that that man's blood is a part of him, he hates that he is in any way like him. But I didn't think he was. I saw someone who loved to laugh and play, just like any other; that wanted a hug when they were sad, someone to laugh when they told a joke, and to hold their hand when they were scared. He just never had that before.

I would help Chara see that he was his own person and not his father, even if it killed me.

 

The incident during our test was declared an accident. I just consider it a miracle that we weren't kicked out. My mother learned of what happened; thinking we could keep something like that from her was like thinking she would wake up and not like snails one day. She seemed to believe it was an accident as well and she gave us one more chance.

No one at the training grounds argued against the decision, but I could tell that not many of them believed it at first. They gave my brother an even larger berth than they had before, and me as well, though for different reasons.

My resonance: destruction magic. With a thought, I can render anything to dust. That's scary even to me; I could only imagine what other some of the other monsters thought.

After the incident, I was allowed to move on with my training. I was paired with Undyne, who seemed to believe less than anyone that what Chara did had been an accident. Luckily she didn't try to attack him again. She couldn't, really. It would have gotten her a lot of trouble.

My brother, it had been ruled, was not ready to move on in the training. He was "unable to demonstrate a significant degree of control in battle" and was held back. He was fine with that, really. It gave him the opportunity to make amends.

You see, after my brother's secrets came clean, his whole demeanor seemed to change. He seemed comfortable; he looked happy. He told me he wanted help learning to control his anger and to make friends, and so I did.

During his spars with other monsters, he began to encourage them, emulating me in his fighting style; no longer trying to end it as fast as possible, but make sure everyone involved came out of it a little better than they were before. Eventually everyone started opening up to him as well – monsters are easy like that – and the incident that day was forgotten.

I never saw Karim again. He had quietly graduated after that day and disappeared. I wanted to apologize to him. Chara did too, but we never got the chance.

All in all, it was just the beginning of another cycle. Things were beginning to settle and I still had enough of my naivety left to believe that it would stay like that. But there are no happy endings to this story, and hopefully by now you've stopped expecting one.

 

Undyne charged at me and stopped short as the weapon in her hands once again disintegrated before her eyes. She shook the dust from her hands and clenched them into fists as she turned back to grab another from the wall. "That's still never going to work." I told her.

The monster turned and stomped her foot on the ground. "Shut up!" she yelled in defiance. I shrugged and waited for her to futilely try again so we could repeat our daily routine for what felt like the millionth time.

After being let in to the next part of the training, my days were spent primarily with the blue scaled monster. The first day back had been a lot of lectures on how the "experience would be incredibly beneficial to both of us." So far all I'd learned is that there is definitely such a thing as too tenacious.

I was reluctant to use my resonance at all at first. I hated the very thought of it, even more so once the dangers of it were explained to me. But, as it was the point of the training, I got over that fear and began trying to make sure that I never lost control over that power. I didn't think I could live with myself if something happened.

My power seemed to be the line that Undyne's ingenuity could not cross. Day after day it had been the same: grab a weapon, charge, I destroy it, rinse, repeat. I had no idea what she was trying to accomplish, but, as it was good practice for me, I just let her keep trying. Anything I tried to do or say was simply met with the response I just received anyway.

Thankfully, I was saved by my brother sliding up to the doorway of the room we were training in. He had big smile on his face like he did everyday now, and it looked nothing but genuine. "Lunch," he announced before another figure tackled him out of sight. I ran to check if he was okay, but the figure reentered the doorway before I could get to him.

"I win!" the towering, avian monster announced. Rein had the same goofy grin on his face that he always did and his big eyes were full of amusement. He looked down at me as he realized I was there. "Oh, hi, your majesty," he said cheerfully.

"What do you mean you won?" My brother said, pushing his way into the door to stand next to me and look up at the monster. "I got here first!" he went on.

"Yeah, but I said first _in_ the room was the winner, not first _to_ the room." Rein explained.

The explanation only served to make my brother look angrier. "You did not!" He argued.

"I did though."

I chuckled to myself as the two went on. Rein had warmed up to Chara more than any other monster had at that point. He'd seemed willing to accept my brother's change of attitude almost immediately. The gigantic monster was tall enough that he had to duck to step through most of the doors in the training hall and any who did not know him well would say he looked both imposing and scary, but he was nothing but kind and friendly. He had the tendency to be competitive though, and, seeing as neither he nor anyone stood a chance against Chara in a fight, he took his victories when and where he could.

Turning behind me I saw Undyne glaring at my brothers back. We locked eyes for a moment ourselves before the monster went to collect her things with an audible _tsk_. More than anyone, Undyne did not believe that what my brother had done to Karim had been an accident, and she didn't seem to understand how everyone could be fooled into believing that it was. She kept her issues with it to herself for the most part though, at least for the moment. I just had to remember to keep an eye out make sure nothing happened.

I turned back to the other two to see Chara still fuming and Rein looking triumphant in their argument. "I thought it was time to eat?" I said to them. "Well, what are we doing standing around here then?" The two looked at me and then back at each other.

"Race you." Rein said with a smirk before he was gone, the dull thumping of his steps following him out the door. Chara stayed put.

"Not going?" I asked.

My brother shrugged. "What's the point? He cheats."

"Alright then," I said as I tapped his shoulder. "I'll race you!"

My brother smiled once more, and in a moment we were bounding down the hallways. We knocked several monsters down along the way, and even passed Rein before we were half way there. I won. Many of the monsters in the camp were already in the mess by the time we arrived and we were swarmed almost immediately. It was a joy to see my brother, who used to shut himself out whenever there was more than one person around, be so warm and open to so many, and even more of a joy to see them act the same way back. That day we ate like kings at a banquet, and then we got a surprise.

"We're going home?" Chara asked mom while we ate dinner that night.

My mom shook her head. "No, we are going _to_ Home. It is important that we visit each part of the Underground every so often. It allows us to keep everyone up to date on certain things, and to remind every monster that we have not forgotten about them."

My brother and I looked at each other excitedly. It had been a long time since we got a vacation, and we planned to make the most of it.

 

The day of our trip, I found that it would be starting on an interesting note. Unlike last time, we would actually be going into Hotland. When I described the place to Chara, he didn't look so eager. At least he wasn't covered in fur… Normally, Hotland was a place that we monsters not made of fire avoided, and the denizens within usually understood. However, we had apparently been getting a number of complaints from the town regarding the newly completed core and my father wanted to get a general consensus as to what it was felt should be done about it.

The core was connected directly to the city beneath our castle and an elevator within would go right down to it. As soon as we stepped out near the bottom, I felt this… unease. The elevator doors slid open to reveal corridor of blue-metal walls with lights and circuitry running down its length. Something in the air seemed to buzz, just outside my hearing. It was making my head ache. Looking at my family, I could tell I was not the only one feeling it. Apparently hundreds of monsters worked in this place every day. How did they put up with it? More importantly, where were they?

We walked down the corridor in that silence that was not truly silent and found ourselves in a massive room, the ceiling easily a hundred feet above our heads. The floor dropped away at the sides revealing rock with giant pipes stuck out of it. The pipes had glass panels on the side that allowed one to see the molten magma within being carried up deeper into the machinery. The pipes, there were eight in total, were all nearly as wide as a building. The sight made me gape. At the other end of the room, a large archway that went almost to the ceiling was open to the world beyond. I could just make out the line of Hotland through the heat haze. That heat was likely being held back from the massive opening by quite the spell, as inside I would almost say it was chilly. Still there was no body there to meet us.

Seeing no reason to stay, and having no strong desire to, we stepped out into the heat and I immediately regretted it. I thought it was bad by the lab.

"The three of you can wait by Waterfall, if you wish. I'm sure this won't take long." My dad told us before we got on our way. My mom looked to my brother and me and I looked to my brother. His shirt already looked wet, but he didn't look as uncomfortable as I would have thought. He just shrugged as a response to my gaze. I looked back to mom and dad and shook my head. A part of me was looking forward to seeing the town, even if I did feel like I was melting.

My father nodded and we began to make our way down the path to Hotland. To either side of us, a lake of molten earth stretched to the edges of the dome that was nearly as big as the one that held Home. The surface was only broken up by the occasional pipe that reached out from the core.

I looked back once we were a little ways down the path and found my eyes drawn upwards unconsciously. To say the core was enormous would not come close to doing it justice. The mass of metal rose more than a half mile up to the top of the dome, into a crevasse in the ceiling where it continued to rise. Pipes snaked out both its bottom and top and made it look like it was the only thing keeping the city above it aloft. For the most part I couldn't make heads or tails of it. The thing looked like a bunch of smaller machines shoved together almost haphazardly. I found myself questioning how just one monster could have designed this and how on earth it could work, even with magic.

I felt Chara tug on my shirt and I was pulled back to reality. My parents were a ways ahead; I must have been staring longer than I thought. My brother and I walked the rest of the way to the town hand in hand. He looked like he was trying very hard not to look behind him.

Hotland sat in the middle of that lake of fire, sitting on several islands of solid land that were connected by bridges encased in glass in the off chance a gas bubble decided to escape the lake and melt a passerby with the resultant splatter. Houses were built of stone and metal and were kept well away from the edges of any of the islands.

A head turned as we approached and a fire monster came running with apologizes that they had not been expecting us and did not have anything ready to help us deal with the heat. Odd, we had told one of the scientists that we would be coming days ago. Why would he not have informed them, and where was he?" My parents seemed to be thinking the same. They exchanges looks while the monster continued to list off things they could do or get for us to make us more comfortable.

"That won't be necessary." My father told them. I saw Chara close his mouth, apparently he had been ready to accept at least one of the offers. "We're here about a number of complaints involving the core."

"Oh, that?" The monster said dismissively. The color of the flame that made up its body seemed to change momentarily. "Just a few of the seniors going on about nightmares and hearing strange whispers sometimes. They blame it on the core because they can probably."

"It was more than a few." My father said back.

"Still, I'm certain there's nothing to it." The monster tried to reassure.

"All the same, I'd like to talk to them myself. I'm sure you could point me in the right direction with ease, yes?"

The monster seemed to grumble and its color shifted once more before it turned and gestured for us to follow. We were led onto another island to a house that looked no different than any other. Our guide knocked on the metal front door and waited. A sound came from inside and the monster opened the door and gestured us in. Chara and I made it as far as the door before a wave of even greater heat made us flinch back. There was no way either of us was going to survive in there for long.

"I think you two should wait out here." My mom told us. Both she and my dad were standing inside the house. They looked no worse for wear than they did on any other day. In fact they had ever since we stepped out of the core. It had to be magic.

Though I had my own questions I wanted answers to, I forced myself to submit that staying out of there was probably the best idea. The door closed behind my parents and Chara and I stood in the street. After a minute our guide bowed to us and said, "Forgive me but I have business I should be about."

I nodded to his request for leave. The monster's look lingered on Chara for just a moment before he turned and left.

"So what do you think's going on?" Chara asked once we were alone. The street was empty but for us. Most of the monsters that lived here worked in the city during the day, leaving the town largely deserted.

"I don't know." I said looking back up at the core. The thing looked no further away now than it had when we first walked out of it. "Something weird," I added.

My brother nodded in agreement.

"Wanna do something?" I offered.

"I barely feel like I can move right now." He said with a smirk.

I chuckled. "Well, you look better than I feel." I told him.

"That's because I'm a lot better at hiding my discomfort than you."

"What's that supposed to mean?" I turned to him.

"That you tend to be a bit of a crybaby." He said frankly.

"I am not!"

Chara giggled. "You're too easy." He said.

If I had the energy, I would have tackled him and thrown him half way to Snowdin. But as it was, I could barely smack him on the arm, which I did.

Mom and Dad were not in there for long, and when they came out they did not look happy. "What did you find out?" I asked them.

"I found out that there are some questions I like to ask the monsters at the lab." My father said vaguely. "But first, I'd like to talk to a few others and see if they have similar things to say."

We got no more than that as we made our way back to a different island and to a different house where my parents went in once again and came out after a few minutes looking even dourer than they had before. We went to three more houses before finally deciding it was time to leave, and my parents' demeanor had not lightened after any of them.

It was another straight path from Hotland to the Lab. I found myself still looking over my shoulder every so often at the empty town we left behind and the giant machine that towered over it. That sense of foreboding unease did not lessen as we left.

Chara's mind seemed to be elsewhere, likely trying to puzzle out this mystery for himself. I was glad when we reached the tunnel that led to the lab that cut the core from sight. It felt like a weight was lifted off me, off of all of us. My parents looked no less fierce though.

When we reached the lab, my father knocked on the door. Just like the last time, there was no response. Unlike last time, when he knocked again there was still no answer. We waited a few minutes before he tried a third time.

"You three go on ahead." He told us after another few minutes. "I'll wait a bit longer and see if I can figure out what this is all about."

My mom herded Chara and I down a side path as my father knocked on the metal door once again, calling out now to anyone that might be inside. The path led around to the other side of lab's metal tower and to the path that lead into Waterfall. My mom took us to the mouth of the cave and then stopped. "You two wait here." She told us. "I am going to go see if your father had any better luck."

We both nodded and she left. I waited until she was out of sight down the tunnel before saying, "One."

"Two," Chara continued.

"Three,"

"Four,"

"Five." We finished simultaneously before we began quietly making our way back ourselves.

We crept up to almost the edge of the cave back where we had left my dad. I heard my parents talking and tried to make out what I could. I was far too curious about what was going on to miss the chance.

"This does not make any sense." I heard my mom say.

"It's as if everyone vanished. Coupled with the stories we heard in town, I don't like where this is going." My father said in response.

"Should we postpone our trip, try to figure out more?" My mother asked.

There was a pause. "No, let's not jump to any conclusions yet. It would not be the first time they've sealed themselves down there for their work. We'll try again on the way back."

"You do not think that this has anything to do with what they were doing with the barrier, do you?"

"I hope not…"

There was another pause. "I still do not like this."

"Neither do I, but nothing has happened yet, so there's not much we can do but wait. Shall we? I'm sure our children are already getting antsy to be on our way."

That was our cue to leave, and we sprinted back to the other cave. Thanks to our training, we weren't even short of breath by the time mom and dad met us there.

The trip through Waterfall was uneventful as we all had our heads wrapped in the mystery of what was going on with the core. Just where are all of the scientists? What were they doing with the barrier? And what did my parents hear from those monsters? Something told me that unless I asked the monsters myself I would never know the answer.

"What do you make of it?" I asked my brother finally as we sat next to the closed doors to Home at the edge of Snowdin forest. The two of us had been allowed to run ahead and explore while they took care of some things in town.

Chara shook his head. His hair was getting long enough now that I couldn't see his eyes when his head was down. "We don't know enough." He said.

"Well, obviously. Do you have any theories, though?"

My brother was silent for a moment. "I think something bad happened."

"You always think something bad happened." I joked.

"I'm serious." He half-snapped at me.

"I know." I said genuinely. "I'm with you on this one. I have a bad feeling about this, I just wish there was more we could do. Do you remember seeing any scientists by the barrier?"

My brother nodded. "I saw a few around the castle; I guess they could've been doing that. I don't know. Whatever they were talking about made no sense to me. I just caught that it had something to do with energy."

I started to pace back and forth in front of the stone doors, scratching my chin. "I feel like I'm missing something!" I shouted in frustration after a few minutes.

"Missing what?" My father asked as both my parents emerged from the trees.

I stood with my mouth open for a moment trying to think of an excuse, luckily Chara thought faster.

"I was telling Asriel a riddle: the more you take of me the more of me you leave behind. What am I?" he said.

My mother thought for a moment. "Why, footsteps. Correct?"

Chara nodded and smiled. I looked embarrassed without having to try very hard at faking it. He could have at least picked a harder riddle.

In contrast to arriving at the core, returning to Home filled me with a calming relief. Seeing the familiar city brought a smile to my face. The slightly purple stone of the buildings, the familiar monsters mulling about; don't get me wrong, I loved New Home too, but there's something about the place you grew up in that just sort of sticks with you.

A few monsters looked our way as they walked down the street or left their homes and they waved excitedly. Both Chara and I waved back as a robed Loox came to meet us. "Forgive me, your majesties," the monster said breathlessly. "I was expecting you to arrive earlier. When you never arrived, I was waiting for message saying you had postponed."

"We were merely sidetracked for a bit." My dad said as he smiled down at the monster. I could tell something was still worrying him at the back of his mind. "It is no problem."

"Would you like me to arrange a council meeting?" The Loox asked next with obvious relief in his voice.

My father shook his head. "No, I trust you've kept things running just fine. That being said though, how are things? Have many asked to leave? Any more problems with the Migosps?"

The two talked back and forth about many topics as we made our way through the city. My mom would pop in with the occasional question as well, but for the most part she hung back with us and talked with the other monsters that greeted us. Pretty much everyone was happy to see us after so long. Many were caught off guard by how open Chara was acting but, monsters being monsters, they took to it pretty quickly.

When we made it to the stairs to our old home we said goodbye to those we had gathered along the way and I raced my brother to the tree in the yard. By the time mom and dad caught up, we were high in the branches, laughing and trying to fight each other with sticks that we pulled from the tree. My mom called us down with a look and we went to the house together.

My first thought was that it felt stuffy, after no one living in it for so long. But with a snap of my mother's fingers, all of the lanterns on the walls lit up and I could see around the corner that the fire place in the kitchen had as well and the stuffiness was banished. Even though it was essentially the same as the house we lived in now, aside from not being in the middle of a castle, that place just felt more lived in. I went into the kitchen and flopped myself down in my mother's reading chair with a sigh. I felt like I could stay like that forever. That was, until Chara decided to jump on top of me. While we wrestled for control of the chair, I heard my mom giggle and saw my dad roll his eyes out of the corner of mine.

"Should we eat dinner here or in the city?" My mom asked and Chara and I stopped struggling against each other for a moment.

"You two are likely to tear down the house if we stay long enough." My dad said to us. "I say the city."

"Me too," I found myself saying. As much as I loved that place, at the end of the day it wasn't home anymore. And I thought it was time I started thinking like that.

My mom nodded. "Well, how about we look around a bit first, then? We should make sure nothing was left behind when we moved."

I looked around the room. Chara still had an arm wrapped around my leg, so I kicked him off the chair. The dining room looked empty enough. The table cloth was gone, the book shelf was empty, and all of the frames on the walls were empty. I seriously doubted they missed anything. Still, I shrugged and got up from the chair. I went towards my old room, and Chara followed.

Inside, the room was just as empty as the rest of the house. All of the furniture remained, new ones were made for the castle, but it was all bare or empty. Even the box of stuffed animals that I had not even looked at for years before we left was empty. I hadn't seen them in the castle though, I wondered where they were. Not that I wanted them or anything, I was simply curious.

Chara jumped onto the bare mattress and looked up at the ceiling. "It's weird," he said. "I feel like I could close my eyes and we'd be in New Home again."

"The builders did a good job, huh? Did you miss this place at all?"

"Yeah," he said reverently, closing his eyes and smiling.

"Really?" I questioned as I continued looking over the room. "Compared to now, I would say you almost never looked happy while you were here."

"I was though. I was just scared."

"Scared of what?"

"That it would end."

"Oh…" I pulled a tack out of the door. There was still a bit of paper stuck to it from when the drawing it held had been pulled off of the wall. I hadn't seen any of those since we moved either.

"You really have a thing for green and yellow, don't you?" Chara said suddenly. I turned around to see him standing in front of the now open closet. He was wearing one of my old shirts that they must have left behind on accident and was looking himself over. "I think I'm keeping this." He announced. I shook my head at his silliness.

"Come on," I told him. "Let go see if mom and dad found anything else."

We went to the end of the hall to my parents' room. Dad was nowhere to be found, but mom had looked like she had rummaged through pretty much everything.

"Look what I managed to dig up." Mom told us turning away from the closet. She held out a black rectangle about as long as her forearm. At one end it narrowed and rounded off into a cylinder, while the other end had a piece sticking up out of it near the top.

"What is it?" I asked.

"It's a video camera." Chara answered and my mother nodded.

"That is right. We happened upon this right before you were born, Asriel. I had forgotten we even had it." My mom fiddled with it for a moment and a part of the side and it popped opened. She turned it to us. "Look," she said.

She pressed a button and the part she had opened lit up. A moment later a miniature version of my dad appeared, like a picture in a frame, except after a moment the picture moved. My dad looked to be standing in one of the courtyards in the city. He was looking away until I heard my mom say. "Look, Gorey, I think I got it to work!" I looked to my mom a second but she was still just looking at the screen. I realized it was coming from the camera.

May dad turned and smiled at the screen. "Say something!" My mom said giddily. "Say something so we can watch it later."

"I love you, Tori." He said, his smile growing wider.

"Oh, you big, sappy oaf, come here." The picture blurred and then the screen went black.

"Amazing, is it not?" My mom asked.

"Yeah," I breathed.

"Here," she said, handing it to me. "You can save some memories on it too. Chara you can show Asriel how to use it, yes?" My brother nodded. "Good, I need to find your father before I start preparing dinner."

 

"Okay Chara, are you ready?" I said as we stood in a courtyard in the city, pointing the video camera at him. He had showed me how it worked while we ate and now we were experimenting with it. "Do your creepy face!"

Chara, who had been facing away from me, spun around and gave the best creepy smile I had ever seen him give. I laughed and said, "That was a good one." I looked down and realized that the screen that showed the video was blank. I looked over the camera to see what I had done wrong. The record light was on, so that wasn't it. Then I looked at the front. "Oops…" I said. "I forgot to take the lens cap off.

Chara sighed and rolled his eyes. "Well, I'm not doing it again."

"What do you mean you're not doing it again?" I turned the record button off and put the camera down on the blanket we had brought with us. Chara was already walking away by the time I looked up again. "We got to try again!" I went on as I followed after him.

"Nope, I don't trust you with it anymore." He said, refusing to look at me. He jumped up onto one of the stone columns that stood in the courtyard and looked around before sitting down atop it.

"Then you do it." I told him, glaring up at him. He shook his head. "Why not?"

"Maybe later," he said finally.

"Kids?" my mom called. "Pie!"

Chara and I exchanged looks. "Pie!" we echoed, running back.

We spent the rest of the night relaxing in the city, after which we went back to the house to sleep. We had to be up early to get back to New Home. Not only did my mom and dad have to get back to work, we weren't allowed many days off from training.

In the end it was a well needed vacation, if not because of what came before, then because of what came after.

 

When we arrived back at the training hall the next day, I could immediately tell something had happened. Instead of walking into the main courtyard to be greeted with warm looks and questions about our trip, we were met with much the same reception as we had received our first day. Heads turned, and they looked at us with suspicion and distrust. No, not us, just Chara, I realized after a moment.

It was if we had stepped back in time, and I didn't quite understand it. Chara tried to ask more than once monster what was going on, but he was lucky just to get a malcontented grunt in response. Even Durga gave us nothing, she simply ordered us to get to work. So Chara and I went our separate ways, hoping something would be revealed over time.

As morning turned to afternoon I had learned nothing new. I found my brother practicing alone in one of the back rooms. I could tell by his cold intensity as he fought against the training dummy that he had had no more luck than I. I worried what affect this was having on him. After everything, to go back to this?

Eventually, Chara noticed my presence and took pause. "Do you want to grab some food?" I asked him.

He took a second to look at the dummy and think before taking up his stance again. "No, I think I'm gonna work off some more steam."

I nodded. "Are you sure you're okay?"

"I'm fine, Asriel." He said with a smile, though I could tell his heart wasn't behind it. "This is hardly the end of the world." I nodded once more and let him be. The sound of wood shattering a moment later verified he was less fine than he wanted me to believe, but I trusted my brother enough to have faith that he would not keep it from me if this was truly getting to him anymore than it would anyone else.

In the mess, monster's still kept their distance from me. Thankfully, Rein sat across from me not long after I sat down myself so I didn't have to eat in silence.

"Hey," he said, seeming almost just as wary as everyone else. "Where's Chara?"

"He's skipping lunch," I told him without looking up from my tray.

"Oh," was all he said in response. I couldn't tell if he was disappointed or relieved.

"So are you going to tell me what happened or are you as tight lipped as everyone else?" I asked, doing a poor job of keeping the frustration out of my voice.

For a moment, Rein looked like he really wasn't going to tell me what was going on. "Karim came by yesterday," he admitted.

My eyes snapped up, but the bulky monster avoided my gaze. "What?" I breathed.

He nodded, still looking at the floor. "He was hoping to catch you, actually. Looked pretty upset when he found out that you and your brother weren't here. It was all pretty normal until people started asking about what happened before he left." He took a pause before going on, though he hardly needed to say it at that point. "He told everyone that he didn't believe what Chara did was an accident."

"And do you believe that?" I asked him, half accusingly before I could help myself.

"He gave a pretty convincing argument…" He said slowly and slightly ashamed.

"So you do believe it." I can't say I wasn't somewhat disappointed. Aside from me, Rein was probably Chara's closest friend.

"Listen, whether I believe it or not, I believe that Chara wouldn't do anything like that again." The avian monster confessed. "I can see that he's changed. The problem is, not a lot of other monsters think that."

"I know," I said after a moment. "But I didn't think it would become that big of a deal."

A silence settled in between us, broken only by Rein drumming is fingers on the table. "Have you talked to Undyne yet today?" he asked suddenly.

"I haven't seen her, why?" It was odd for the monster to miss a day of training, but I had had other things on my mind and hardly noticed.

"I'd watch out for her. She likes humans less than most, especially your brother."

I knew as much already. "So? You don't think she'd do anything, do you?"

"I wouldn't put it past her." He said bluntly. "Not after this; not now that she has monsters in her corner."

"And what exactly do you think she would do?" I had the suspicion that Rein knew more than he was saying.

The monster shrugged. "You know her; she's as unpredictable as they come." Rein stood up from the table before continuing. "I'd just keep an eye open if I were you."

This was all beginning to give me a sense of déjà vu, and I didn't like it. I took Rein's words to heart as I finished my lunch and went back to training. Undyne was already there by the time I made it back, acting like she hadn't been missing that morning at all. She didn't bring up the matter of Chara and neither did I as we went through our daily ritual. All for the better I supposed.

The rest of the day passed without incident, and as Chara and I made our way out of the Hall I explained to him what had happened. He simply sighed.

"Knowing monsters, it'll all be back to normal in a week." I tried to assure him.

"You're probably right," my brother admitted, "but it makes me wonder. What exactly is normal for us? Seems like the second we get used to things, everything gets turned upside down."

I shrugged. "Such is the gift of life." I told him, and then I stopped as I remembered something. "I gotta go back for a second. Wait for me by the elevator!" I was off running before I even finished, leaving Chara confused in the middle of the hall.

I ran back to the training room as fast as I could, worried someone might take it by accident. Luckily when I got there it was still tucked into the corner where I had left it. Turning it over for a moment to make sure everything was as it should be, I put it in my bag and began my way back to Chara.

Now, indulge me a second. I know you are all _dying_ to find out what happens next, but I need to get something out of the way first. Have you ever stood in a room, near a doorway or the like, and just had this feeling that if you took another step forward that your life as you know it would be over? That to take that step, to enter that doorway, would spell death for you or others? You think to yourself, 'that's absurd! I'm just imagining it' and you take that step anyway, unconcerned of the sign fate most likely just sent you. There is no rational explanation for either conclusion; it is simply one of the mysteries of the world.

If you haven't ever experienced something like that before, and in the future you do, take my advice: Run. Run in the other direction. It doesn't matter if your friends, your family, or your lover is on the other side of that step, run.

I didn't listen… As I was almost to the side street next to the training hall where my brother would be waiting near the elevator to go home, I had this sickening feeling well up inside me. I stopped and just stood looking down the hallway. Maybe it was the silence, or the fact that I was alone in that place where it seemed like you were almost never alone, or just a product of my nerves from everything that had happened that day, but something felt off. After a moment, I shook it away, remembering that Chara was waiting for me, and took off at a run again, albeit much slower that time.

I heard voices before I could turn into the street and I stopped again. I peeked into the alley and saw Chara still standing by the entrance to the elevator. He was looking further down the street. I followed his gaze and found Undyne walking up to him out of the shadows.

"I was starting to think I'd never catch you alone." She was saying. "Is The Big Bad Human too afraid to leave the prince's side?"

Chara was calm, looking like he was trying his best to ignore the monster. "He's my brother," he said in answer to Undyne's question. "Why wouldn't I want to be with him?"

"Well, he's not here now."

"No, but he'll be right back."

I could've walked up then; I could have rejoined my brother and we could have left and maybe then nothing would have happened. But I don't really think it would have changed anything, it all would have just happened on another day and everything could have been a whole lot worse. Regardless, for whatever reason I used to justify myself at the time, I stayed hidden around the corner to wait and see what happened next.

"How did you do it?" Undyne asked him next. Chara remained silent looking at the ground as if he were ready to go home and get some sleep. "How did you manage to fool practically everyone into thinking you had done what you did on accident and then miraculously became a different person?" the monster clarified.

Chara gave a chuckle. "You've been waiting a while for this, haven't you?"

"I have, and that's why I want an answer." Undyne took a step forward; my brother remained still. I felt a pang of worry that something would go wrong if I let this go on, but I also felt like I needed to trust me brother, to stay confident that he really had changed and was able to stand up for himself.

"Go home, Undyne." Chara said after a drawn out silence. "I'm too tired to deal with this today."

"I'm not going anywhere until I get the truth." The monster stated.

"I've given the truth to you and to everyone." Chara maintained. "If choose not to accept it that's your problem."

Undyne smirked. "What's wrong? You seem angry." Who wouldn't be angry if they were being badgered like that? I thought to myself. "I know, we'll settle this with a fight. If I win, you tell me the truth. If you win, I'll believe you and leave you alone form now on. What do you say?"

"It's against the rules for us to fight, remember?" Chara said, calm and still.

"We're not in the training hall." Undyne reminded him. "Besides, isn't this the perfect opportunity to shut me up just like you did Karim?"

I thought that would be the nail in the coffin and nearly jumped out of my hiding place, but I realized to some relief that Chara had not been goaded. "The next test is in a month." He told her. "If I pass, we can fight all you want after that."

"But why wait?" Undyne slung the bag she carried off of her shoulder and dug two spears out of it. "Humans love fighting, right? They live for this sort of thing. No one's going to catch us; they all left or are in their rooms already. Why not blow off a little steam, huh? Undyne tossed one of the spears to Chara who caught it deftly out of the air. The monster readied herself, my brother's decision already made in her eyes.

Chara simply stood still as a statue one more, staring down the monster, then he let go of the spear and it dropped to the ground with a clang. "I've had enough fighting for one day." He said almost absently and he went to lean against the wall next to the elevator doors.

I smiled to myself and began to go join my brother when Undyne let out a yell. "I'm not going to let you get away with this!" The monster shouted. "You may have everyone else fooled, but not me; never me. You humans are exactly like they say in all of the stories, and there's no place for you here. If you won't fight back, that's fine by me."

I pieced together what Undyne was saying fast enough. I jumped into the street the next second just as Undyne charged. I ran to my brother and pulled him aside. Holding out my hand, Undyne's spear turned to powder and instant later and I grabbed her arm as her momentum carried her to me. Spinning, I threw the monster back down the street and she landed with a thud

"Asriel?" Chara asked behind me.

I turned my head and flashed him a smile. "Sorry I took so long." As Undyne sprung back up I took a step towards her. "What the heck has gotten into you?" I shouted at the monster. "Attacking my brother outside of training? I could have you kicked out, jailed!"

My words did not shock the monster out of her rage like I had hoped, instead she looked up at me with the same anger she had for my brother and… disappointment? "You know, I used to look up to you, your highness," she said softly, "but the human has you fooled better than anyone."

"The only one not in their right mind is you." I snapped back.

Undyne chuckled to herself. "We'll see." Then she vanished. I looked behind me and saw the monster between me and my brother, reaching for the spear he had dropped. It was dust before her fingers even grazed it and my knee was in her midsection before Chara could even move. Another kick knocked the monster back down the street once more.

"Asriel…" Chara began.

"Don't worry Chara, I'll handle this." I told my brother. "She hasn't been able to beat me yet." The monster stood back up once more just as I knew she would, no less discouraged than she had been before. "I don't want to fight you like this Undyne. Is this really worth throwing your life away for?" I ask her.

She answered without hesitation, "Yes." She charged at me this time, another spear in her hands that I didn't even see her pick up.

The monster would never learn. I let her get close to within my reach before rendering her weapon useless and wound my arm back to knock her out for good. But something was off. The monster smiled and then twisted her body into a spin as her foot hit the ground in front of me. When she was facing me again, another spear was in her hands. When had she grabbed it?

That was all I had time to think before the weapon slashed me across the chest and I fell back in shock and pain. Chara was knelling over me a moment later, tears already in his eyes. I reached up and tried to tell him that I was alright, but the words would not come. My brother's panic grew by the moment and I could do nothing to reassure him. My vision faded and I fought to stay conscious. I realized that I was probably not alright.

I hear Undyne cackle below me and my brother turns. My head slumps to the side as he does and I see the other monster raise her hand as a spear materializes into it. "Useful spell, huh? Wouldn't have figured it out if not for you, your highness." Chara stood up and stepped towards Undyne. "You might want to get him to some help; he looks like he needs it." The monster said to him. "Or are you finally ready to fight?"

"You hurt my brother." Chara said simply.

Undyne laughed. "So I did. What are you going to do about it?"

The reality of everything hits me like a ton of bricks somewhere around there, and I realize just how mad this all is. I want to scream. I want to scream for all of this to stop before it got worse. I wanted to scream for Undyne to get away, but I couldn't move. She stood there, overconfident in her new ability, but she had never seen my brother's magic. She had no idea what he was capable of.

Chara took another step and the world seemed to explode. The sides of the buildings around us collapsed and the ground beneath Undyne's feet shattered. Everything flew at the monster and she jumped to avoid the rubble crushing her. In midair, she threw her spear at Chara who merely bent to the side to let it slide part him. Raising his hand, a red band shot out and tied itself around the monster before Chara pulled and the monster rocketed to the ground, kicking up even more dust and debris.

I had hoped that was the end of it, but Undyne never knew when to give up. She pulled herself to her feet, small gashes over her body leaking white light. She managed a smile as she struggled to keep herself on her feet. "I will not lose." She mumbled. Flashes of blue appeared in the air above her that solidified into several spears all pointing at my brother. Undyne yelled one last time and the weapons hurled themselves at my brother.

Chara did not even move. When the spears were but a few feet from him they stopped, seeming to vibrate in place as my brother's magic stopped the monster's. Undyne wasted a moment to look shocked, and in that time the spears spun to point back at her and sped through the air once more. Most missed her completely, but I saw one solidly graze the side of her head, twisting her off her feet to crash to the ground. She did not get back up that time.

Chara stood staring at the destroyed ruin of the street for a long moment and then he was over me once more. He did not look sad, nor angry, nor anything. That dead look was back in his eyes and I wept as the world went black.

When I came to, I was home, in my bed. Chara sat at its foot with his knees to his chest and did not stir as I sat up and hugged him. That night I was the only one who cried, but the funny thing is the only thing I can remember thinking was that the present I had gotten him was gone.

 

I never really talked about that, huh? Forgive me, my mind is a bit jumbled, as you could imagine.

That day held one more significance: it marked a year since Chara had joined our family. We wanted to celebrate one year of being brothers by getting each other presents. We had planned it for months. We tried to hide it from each other as best as we could, when we went out to buy something and what we were getting, but I had figured out what Chara was getting me about a week before. He's bad at keeping secrets when had anything to do with something positive. Chara had taken the stone Gerson had given him and had it turned into a necklace. I thought it was a bit much, but I realized my present needed to be just as good. With the help of a few monsters around the city I learned how to forge weapons and I made Chara a dagger he could use throughout the rest of the training. But, it was lost that day in the alley. And by the time I had gone back for it, it was gone.

We never even talked about it after what happened. We never exchanged gifts. I wonder what happened to them…

* * *


	7. The Second Mistake

You would have thought that, after that, I would've been afraid of my brother. Maybe a part of me was; I don't really remember. More than anything, though, I remember feeling guilty. I watched the smile get ripped from Chara's face and it never truly came back again. All of that progress… undone in an instant. All because I was such an idiot…

I learned that day just how deep monsters' feelings towards humans were buried, and that I didn't try hard enough to dig them up. I thought having the majority on our side was enough, but that wasn't the case. If you really want to change this world, there is only all or nothing. I told myself I wouldn't make that mistake again.

 

After what happened in the alley, all three of us were kicked out of training. The story I told them was that we were just eager to keep practicing and so we risked it outside of normal training before everything went wrong. Despite her pride, Undyne went along with the story as well, knowing that if she spoke up with the truth it would land her in greater trouble as well.

Durga yelled at all of us until her voice cracked; she came all the way to the castle just to do that. My dad simply looked like had half expected something like this. My mom, after learning we were okay, only seemed relieved. I was actually surprised with how easy we had gotten off with her, though there was a strict "no magic inside the castle without me or your father there" policy put in place after that day.

Undyne lost her left eye. Such a thing is possible to heal with monsters if your quick enough, but they weren't. I took about a week to recover from my injury. All the while Chara wouldn't leave my side but would all but refuse to look at me. I would hear him whisper apologizes in his sleep, in between the whimpers and the sudden jolts. He hadn't had nightmares like that since before we moved. Awake, my brother was back to his silent, scared self and I felt like I was back at the beginning, and it was all my fault. It took me a long time just to convince him I didn't hate him afterwards.

Once I was better, I decided to redouble my efforts to make my brother happy. I tried to get Chara out there, tried to help him see that there was still reason to keep going, while at the same time trying to show monsters that most of their hatred towards humans was irrational and unfounded. All so that my brother could be in a world where he felt accepted, where he felt loved. But, he seemed to be sabotaging me at every turn; antagonizing fights, spewing insults and more every time my back was turned.

Finally, I questioned his motives. Why would he be doing this to himself? I didn't understand it. His answer came simply, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. He said it like I had asked him how he liked last night's dinner. He said, "I want monsters to hate humans, just like I hate humans."

I told him that was ridiculous, how could he be happy in a world like that? He told me to stop. I asked why. He said, "I'm not worth the effort."

I wanted to argue with him. I wanted to scream at him for even thinking that.

But I didn't…

I saw how strongly my brother felt that way and realized that I had done everything wrong once again.

After that, I did stop. I understood that the root of the problem had not been solved. Chara hated himself even more after what happened with Undyne, and until that was gone, he would never be able to move forward. I began to spend most days in the castle with my brother, just playing for the most part; doing anything, really, to keep his mind off of the world around us. He seemed to prefer that anyway, just me, him, mom and dad, and after a while I began to see glimmers of how Chara was before. That castle became our world, and I like to think we left our mark over every inch of it during those times. My parents seemed to accept that as the way things were now. I think they were just we were staying out of trouble.

I resumed my normal studies with my mom in lieu of the training. Chara sat out for most of it. I didn't press the issue. We continued to practice magic on our own in a limited capacity, but never fought again. After a while, though, I could tell mom and dad were beginning to get worried. I could tell they thought that us staying in all of the time meant we were unhappy when on the contrary we were probably happier than ever. Convincing them of that was another matter, however, and they needed to be convinced or else everything would be undone yet again.

Chara was finally in a place where he was at least somewhat happy again, and I wasn't about to let anyone change that for him.

 

"We _could_ just tell them." My brother suggested as we stared at the ceiling in our room. Both of us were laying across the short of my bed, our knees dangling over the side and our feet making a light _swish_ as they brushed against the carpet.

"Then they'd definitely think something was wrong." I told him.

"I think you're overcomplicating this." He chided.

"I think you have no mind for subtlety." I said back as I sat up. "Plus, they never actually told us they're worried, so if we just go up to them and say 'hey, we're not sad, we swear!' that will raise more than one red flag."

"Do you have a better idea in mind?" He asked.

I thought a minute before falling back on my bed. "No, that's why I asked you."

Chara's eyes had not moved from their spot on the ceiling since we started talking. I could tell his mind was half elsewhere. I didn't know where. I had stopped asking. "Beats me." He said.

A knock came from the door, pulling us from our thoughts, and my mother called, "Boys? Dinner."

"Coming!" I shouted back. I turned to my brother who was finally looking at me. "We'll think of something later." I told him, smiling.

Dinner was strangely quiet, to the point where I nearly asked if something was wrong. My parents barely looked at one another and I didn't find out why until after when my dad pulled me and Chara aside while my mom cleaned up. He looked over his shoulder to check if she was listening and once he was satisfied that her attention was elsewhere, he leaned down and whispered, "Your mother and I are going to go out tomorrow."

"Okay," I said back to him just as softly. "Why are we whispering?"

"Because it is our anniversary tomorrow and your mother thinks I have completely forgotten about it." He smiled and looked over his shoulder again. "I want it to be a surprise, so keep it a secret, okay?"

He looked really excited and, being a kid, that excitement immediately rubbed off on me. "Not a problem!" I told him, snapping up straight and saluting with my fist over my chest. Chara simply nodded.

After that, we went up to the upper towers of the castle. Golden light covered the city as the sun over the surface began to set and the scene was reflected by the underground kingdom. There was no sun in the suggested sky of the dome and at times I wondered why that was if they could do everything else that they did. "Does the sky actually look like this on the surface?" I asked Chara as we looked out over the city.

Chara stood above me on the steeply sloped cone of the tower's roof with little difficulty while I sat on the flatter part near the bottom. I took in the colors of the sky, going from blue to almost red as my eye crossed from left to right. "Sort of," my brother told me. "It's bigger up there."

I nodded and watched the final light fade from the city and the nighttime stars take its place. Anyone who lived in the city long enough would be able to tell that that was fake. They were the same stars every night. The same lights streamed across the same places at the same times. It made sense, really. After all, it was just made off of someone's memory.

"Mom and dad really love each other, huh?" Chara spoke up all of the sudden. He sat down next to me and looked at his feet.

"Yup," I said in return, smiling to myself. "They've been together a long time."

"Do you think we'll be together that long?" he asked.

I looked to Chara for a moment. His eyes seemed to glow beneath the stars as he looked back at me. "Of course, boss monsters live forever as long as they don't have a baby." I told him.

"Humans don't…" he said quietly. There was fear and sadness in his words.

I took my brother's hand in mine. "Don't worry, Chara," I assured him. "I'm certain we'll be together forever."

He smiled back at me, but it was bittersweet. "You're just saying that." I shook my head.

"There has to be a way," I argued. "We'll get the scientists in Hotland to research it." My brother seemed less than convinced. I squeezed his hand until he looked back up at me again. "I promise you," I told him, "as long as I'm here, you will be too. We'll be just like mom and dad."

And then it clicked in my head. "That's it!" I shouted, standing up. "We should do something for them. I bet that will make them feel better."

"How?" My brother said doubtfully once he was able to follow my leap in topic.

I rolled my eyes. "Just trust me, okay?"

"Alright, what should we do?" Chara questioned.

"I know, let's try to make a pie!" It was genius. I could already see their faces.

"But we've never cooked anything before." Chara informed me.

I shrugged. "How hard could it be?"

 

"We likely will not be back until late," mom was saying as she and my dad were getting ready to leave. Apparently she thought they were going to deal with some dispute on the other side of the city and dad would reveal his true intent once they got there. I smiled and nodded at her words, still playing ignorant. "Both lunch and dinner is in the fridge if that ends up being the case," she went on. "And do try to keep the house in one piece." Dad was already out in the hall, patiently for her to finish. Mom took one last look around as she ran through her mental checklist before looking back down to us. "Are you sure you'll be alright on your own?"

"Yes, mom." I said tolerantly, hoping she would realize her concern was unnecessary.

She sighed and nodded reluctantly. "I suppose my boys are growing up…" She leaned down and hugged us both before adding one last goodbye and turning to go. When she was past dad, he gave us a wink before following after her.

Chara and I waited in the hallway for a minute to make sure they didn't come back for any reason. "Gone?" I asked him.

"Gone," he confirmed.

"Then let's do this." We high-fived and ran into the dining room, over to the bookshelf, and began scanning through the spines for the right one. "Anything?" I asked as I neared the end of my section.

"Nothing," Chara answered. We met in the middle and still hadn't found it. "It could still be in the kitchen," my brother suggested. I shook my head.

Taking a step back, I tried to see into the top shelves and saw it almost immediately. "Of course it is…" I groaned.

Chara joined me and followed my gaze. "You sure?"

"Unfortunately," I breathed, "Come on." I stepped back in front of the bookshelf and got onto my hands and knees. "Hop up and see if you can reach it." I told him.

Chara did so with little hesitation and I struggled to keep upright. After a minute, all I could think was that he seemed to be taking his sweet time with it. "Did you find it yet?" I asked up to him.

"Hold still," he said back. I wanted to throw him off.

"You're pretty heavy, you know that?" Something hit me in the back of the head before a book landed on the floor next to me.

"Sorry," Chara said following it. "I think that's it though." My brother hopped, literally, off of my back and I got to my feet as he picked up the book and handed it to me.

"It better be or else you're going on the bottom next," I practically growled at him. But, thankfully, it was the book we were looking for – a steaming pie embossed on the leather cover confirmed it – and we ran to the kitchen.

And yes, I did realize later that there were chairs about five feet from us, thanks for mentioning.

"Did you find the recipe yet?" I asked as I placed the stack of bowls on the counter. Chara was standing on a stool we pulled up to the counter, looking intently at the book open in front of him.

"I can't read a single word of this." He said.

I hopped up onto the stool next to him and looked at the book. It was written in the language monsters used in the time before we were sealed off. It was no wonder he couldn't read it. "Let me see. " I said and slid the book in front of me. I flipped through a few pages until I found the recipe for butterscotch pie. "Here it is." I announced.

"What do we need?" I might have said then that my brother sounded almost eager.

I ran my finger across the page. "Let's see, first the crust: two cups flour, half a cup of water, two spoons of sugar and… buttercups."

"Huh?" Chara questioned. "Are you sure you're reading that right?"

"It's says right here." I told him pointing at the words. I had to study the language if I wanted to become king, since most our old documents were written in it, and so I had a pretty good grasping of it, and it clearly said buttercups. Or so I thought.

"I don't think we have any of those in the kitchen." Chara deduced.

"There's probably some growing around the castle somewhere." I suggested. "Let's start there."

 

We scoured the courtyards at the base of the castle looking for our elusive flower. Each was strangely empty for the time of day, but we paid little notice to that fact. The castle was home to all manner of plant life that could not be found anywhere else in the Underground, most of them brought to life by mom's and dad's memory of the surface. Eventually we found what we were looking for, wasting nearly an hour in the process, and so we raced back home to make up for lost time.

"You better be right about this." Chara said as he put the bundle of flowers down on the counter next to the other ingredients. We had grabbed quite a few of them since neither of us could remember how much we needed.

I rolled my eyes at him. "What else could it be?"

He shrugged. "How should I know? This just seems… off."

I waved at my brother dismissively. "Don't worry, food can be made using almost anything anyway. Mom just always says it tastes better this way."

Chara shrugged again. "If you say so."

I turned to the book. "Alright, first we need to mix all of the dry ingredients into a bowl and then add the water and the buttercups."

"It doesn't count the buttercups as dry?" Chara asked, turning one of the flowers over in his hand. That did seem off to me as well.

"Well, there is water in them, right? Maybe it's because of that?" I justified.

"Could be," my brother agreed. "What part of the flower are we supposed to use? The whole thing?"

I turned back to the book again. "It doesn't say. It just says 'stir until dough is thoroughly mixed.'"

"It's not going to get very thorough like this." He indicated and I had to agree.

I thought for a moment before jumping up onto the counter to get into one of the cabinets above it. "Maybe we're supposed to grind them up." I said as I pulled a mortar and pestle out and handed them to Chara before dropping back down to the ground. "That makes sense, right?"

"I guess…"

"Great! You do that, and I'll get the rest ready." While Chara mashed away at the flowers, I mixed up the other ingredients for the crust and got out everything we would need for the filling. Once Chara was done, we added everything else to the bowl and mixed until we were certain it would mix no more. Then we stepped back to look at what we had so far.

"I don't remember it being… green." My brother commented.

"Food always changes color when it's cooked." I defended.

Chara grabbed the spoon and lifted it out of the bowl. The dough ran out of it to rejoin the rest. "It's too thin." He added. "You're supposed to be able to roll it out."

I tapped my chin as I tried to think of a way to fix that. "Maybe that's the part you use magic for…"

"I don't think that's it…" he argued.

"Good, because then we'd be stuck. What do you think then?"

He thought for a moment, looking at everything that was on the counter. "More flour?" he tried, grabbing the bag.

We added another cup of flour, which did thicken it up, but not nearly enough. "I'm beginning to really think we need magic for this…" I thought out loud.

"I know!" Chara exclaimed all of the sudden. "Let's use some of the butterscotch! It's pretty thick." He slid the jar over to me and immediately it made sense.

I smiled and patted him on the back. "Good thinking, Chara."

We added the butterscotch to the dough and it seemed to do the trick. With that hurtle surmounted, we went on to the next step.

"'Using a little more than half the dough, roll it into a thin circle about twelve inches wide.'" I read from the book. "Easy enough. Where's the rolling pin?"

"Rolling pin," Chara said as he handed it to me from a cabinet beneath the counter.

I had seed mom do this a few times, so I was pretty sure I knew the trick to it. I spread some flour onto the counter and made sure to cover my hands and the rolling pin as well. I grabbed the dough and began to slowly roll it out, adding more flour as needed. When I was done, it was less than perfect – a little uneven in thickness and definitely far from a perfect circle – but I'd still say it was a good first attempt.

I laid the pie crust in the tray and stuck it in the oven while Chara and I made the filling which went much more smoothly. I then let my brother fill the pie and roll out the top crust. "Remember to cut some holes in it so the whole thing doesn't explode." I reminded him, reading through the recipe once more to make sure we didn't forget anything.

Finally, it was all done. We put the pie in the oven, set the timer, and reveled for a moment. "We actually did it." Chara commented.

"Yeah," I breathed. "That went better than I expected, all things considered."

"What should we do now?"

I looked around the kitchen as I thought. "There's still a lot of flowers left." Half of the pile we had gathered still sat on the counter. I went over and grabbed a bunch of them.

"Are you saying we should make another one?"

"No," I told him simply as I stuck one of the flowers in his hair. The action produced a satisfying groan from my brother and he tried to swipe the rest away from me, but I kept them out of his reach, giggling to myself. Chara lunged for them, trying to reach over me as I held them behind my back, and while he did I stuck another one in his hair to even out the look. He tried to shake the blossoms loose, but was unsuccessful, and when he tried to pull them out by hand, I would simply put another in its place. Eventually he grew sick of it and grabbed a handful of flowers off the counter as well. I tried to stop him from sticking them in my fur, but where I was craftier, Chara was still faster. It didn't take long until we were chasing each other around the kitchen and practically throwing flowers at one another, and time must have flown by because the next thing I knew…

"We are back!" Mom's voice came from the hallway. Chara and I froze. Half a second later she and my dad both poked their heads into the kitchen and their reactions said everything. "Why is the kitchen such a mess?" mom questioned, dismayed.

"Where did all of these flowers come from?" dad added.

I looked around the kitchen myself. It was a mess, I realized. Flour was everywhere, drips of the filling were on the wall and the floor, all of the bowls and utensils still littered the counter, not to mention there were buttercups everywhere. The timer decided to go off at just that moment, making Chara jump.

"Surprise!" I cried.

 

A little while later, after the kitchen was cleaned up and the pie had a chance to cool, we all sat down at the table. Chara and I were all smiles while mom and dad were looking at the dessert in disbelief. "What brought this about?" Dad asked.

"We wanted to do something for your anniversary." Chara told them.

"And because we love you." I added.

That made Mom giggle. "Well, thank you, Asriel, Chara. That was very considerate of you two."

I took the liberty of cutting them each a piece. Chara and I both waited eagerly for their reactions.

Mom took a moment to look the pie over while Dad went right for it. He froze with the fork still in his mouth. "It's certainly… interesting." He said, his voice coming out slightly strained. Mom then took her first bite and her reaction was much the same.

"What did you boys use in this?" she asked.

I could already tell it was going less than perfectly. "We just followed the recipe…" I told her.

"Are you certain of that?" she went on. "The filling is fine, but the crust is…"

My mood slumped. I guess out first attempt didn't go as well as I thought it had. Chara must have looked much the same next to me, because the next thing I knew Mom's arms were around us both, squeezing us tightly.

"Do not worry," she told us. "It is the thought that counts. Thank you both so much for doing this for us. I am sure it will be better next time."

When she pulled away, the first thing I saw was Dad wolfing down the rest of the pie like a mad man. As he finished, he slammed the hand that held his fork down on the table. "I thought it was delicious." He told us with his big, goofy grin. I could tell he was lying, but it still made me happier.

Mom gave him a disapproving look and I started to laugh; even Chara smiled.

Later, we all gathered in front of the fire. Mom was sitting on Dad's lap in the big arm chair, and Chara and I were lying on the floor. "So what did you do today?" I asked them. I was eager to learn how Dad's plan had gone.

"Well," Mom began, "after spending most of the morning silently brooding, I was delightfully surprised by your father with a picnic in the park by the city center. It was all so elaborately set up that I almost did not believe it. There were lights, there was music; it was all very romantic." She leaned back into Dad's arms. "Even after all this time, you still do not cease to amaze me." She told him.

"I was worried I wouldn't be able to pull it off," he admitted. "With how you were acting this week I was afraid I would have to tell you or risk losing my life."

"Can you blame me for being angry for thinking you had forgotten our anniversary after nine hundred and ninety four years?" Mom defended.

Dad let out a chuckle. "No, I suppose not." All of the sudden, his eyes seemed to glaze over and his mouth hung open.

"Gorey, are you alright?" Mom asked, concern writ on her face.

Dad said nothing. He seemed to stare into space before suddenly snapping back into focus as a hand came up to cover his mouth. He was up and running out of the room an instant later, almost throwing Mom off of him in the process, and she was just as quickly running after him.

Chara and I looked to each other, stunned and confused. A moment later I could hear Dad being sick in the hallway and my brother and I shot to our feet. We only peaked out into the hallway, scared that something bad had happened. Dad was hunched over and leaning against the wall, still being sick, and Mom was leaning over him with a hand on his back.

"M-mom?" I said timidly.

Mom looked over her shoulder before running over to us. "You two go wait in the kitchen." She told us.

"Is Dad okay?" I could feel tears welling up in my eyes.

"Your father will be fine." She assured us. "This is what he gets for eating all of that pie like that. Do not worry." I heard a grunt and then something crash to the floor. Mom turned around and gasped. I couldn't see what had happened, but the sound alone made it feel like something broke inside me. "Oh God, Asgore!" Mom screamed before sprinting away from us.

Dad was on the floor in a heap, and the sight made me collapse as well. As Mom tried to shake Dad awake, Chara wrapped his arms around me. I had never been more scared in my entire life.

 

The flowers we had used in the pie were poisonous. The recipe had called for cups of butter, not buttercups. When my mom told us that, I wanted to cry all over again, I wanted to disappear, I wanted to run to my dad and tell him I how sorry I was. For the first time, I thought I understood why my brother would want to shut out the world. The guilt of that night nearly crushed me.

My father would be fine, mom assured us. It was nothing life threatening, just a few days in bed, but that didn't make me feel any better. Even dad saying it wasn't our fault didn't make me feel any better.

That night, it was Chara comforting me while I sat on my bed with my head to my knees as I tried retreat into the solace of nothingness. All I could think about was how I only ever seemed to make mistakes… and how much I hated myself for it…

I guess somethings really do never change…


	8. The Second Adventure

For a long time, that was the end of it. I would love nothing more than to tell you that that's the end of the story; that after that day we all came together as a family and never suffered a day of misery ever again, but life doesn't quite work that way. No matter how calm things may seem, as long as you're still breathing something will go wrong eventually. It's only a matter of time. But, for a long, long time, everything was great. It was great enough that I let myself lower my guard. I stopped looking for the signs that something was amiss. I will never make that mistake again.

I lived my life for my brother, both inwardly and outwardly at that point. I no longer cared about anything else, really. Monsters – even mom and dad past a point – had taken second place in my mind. I dedicated everything I had to ensuring my brother's happiness. And, once more, I thought it had worked.

Slowly, he started to reconnect. With himself, with the world around him, with the future. Once more, he took an interest in the world of monsters and how it was run. He joined in my lessons, asked questions, and even applied himself. Eventually we started to take up official positions and responsibilities in the kingdom. Chara acted the part well; he almost seemed born to lead. Monsters even started calling him 'Your Highness' like the rest of us, and as often as he told them not to, they wouldn't stop. I think he secretly liked it.

More than anything else, though, Chara seemed to take an interest in souls. He tried to learn as much about them as he could. I thought it admiral of him, though what thought process could have made him want to try to destroy the barrier, I have no idea. He didn't seem like he was sick if it down here, but perhaps he was. I don't know, I never asked.

I stopped questioning my brother's actions a long time ago.

Regardless, during that impossibly long yet immensely short span of time, things were… normal. And I was hardly able to realize that before it all came crashing down on our heads again. It all started with a simple request, to which my immediate response was,

 

"What?" I looked at both my parents as if I had not heard them right, I was pretty sure I hadn't. Chara stood at my side with much the same look. He was taller than me now, just by a hair, though I had grown myself. My mom had begun to keep a record on one of the walls in the kitchen as proof. Both she and my dad smiled to each other in response to my reaction.

"We want the two of you to go to Home." My dad repeated. So, I had heard right then.

I still had to blink before I could say anything. "On our own?" I tried to confirm.

"Yes, on your own." My mom answered, though she hardly sounded happy about the fact. She kept her hands firmly on top of her lap, likely to keep them from shaking with worry. "Your father and I have discussed this," she went on, still sounding slightly pained, "and we believe that you are ready for the responsibility."

My dad, who was standing behind mom's chair, rested a hand on her shoulder and took over. "It will be no different than any of the trips we have all taken together," he explained. "Simply spend a few days in the city, check up on the residents, settle any matters that you can; I have no doubt it is something you two are fully capable of doing on your own." The fact that that 'I' was supposed to include mom as well was heavily implied. She gave him a sharp look in response and he pulled his hand away.

I wasn't sure how to respond. Up until that moment the most we had done was sit in an office in the lower parts of the castle and listen to monsters to decide whether or not what they had to say required our parents' attention. Most of the time their problems were simple enough that we were able to work them out ourselves, or simple enough that we didn't understand why they were even bringing it to us in the first place. I guess it wasn't that big of a leap. A part of me was excited by the idea, but how would Chara feel about it? He still hardly liked going out of the castle most days. Something like this could send him spiraling back down in no time if I wasn't careful. Perhaps it was better if we waited until we could all go.

"We'll do it." I heard my brother say, and it was his turn for me to question if I heard him right.

My dad let out a breath while mom sucked one in. "Good," dad said, "You can leave in the morning. We'll set everything up in the meantime."

By the time we made it back to our room, the look I was giving Chara must not have changed at all because he turned to me and asked, "What?"

"That was a surprise," I said back. "Is this really something you want to do?"

He shrugged. "Why not? It's been forever since you got to see that city."

I shook my head. "That's not important," I told him. "If this isn't something you want to do, then we don't have to go. Mom and dad won't force us."

"No, but they did ask nicely." My brother pointed out.

"Chara, if-"

"Asriel," he interrupted. Chara stepped up to me and placed his hands on the sides of my head, drawing my eyes to his. "I want to do this." He told me. "So, shush." He even smiled. It was still not the smile I remember seeing at one point, but it was close enough that I believed him.

 

The next morning was consumed by my mom stressing over everything while she helped us get ready to leave. "Remember to eat at regular times. Just because you will be somewhere else does not mean you can neglect yourselves, otherwise you will never be able to grow up big and strong." Or, "Remember when dealing with the Migosps to not lend anything they consider a 'problem' any weight or you will just encourage their nonsensical behavior. Do so nicely, however; they are not tough as the face they like to out on." Or, "I do not want either of you two staying up late. You will hardly be setting a good example if you are not up until midday." All the while straightening our clothes and fiddling with our packs and looking for any possible excuse to delay us a minute longer.

In the end, my dad had to intervene. "They're as ready as they'll ever be, honey." He said as he joined us in the hallway. "You've given them enough to keep them for twice as long as they mean to stay." He chuckled, but my mom found no humor in his words, preferring to scowl at him instead, which only made him laugh harder.

It was still another five minutes or so before we were actually able to leave, with mom following us all the way to the elevator and the closing doors cutting off her third reminder to brush our teeth.

The elevator dropped us off near the foyer on the ground floor. From there we had to go into the city to continue on our way. It had been awhile since I had stepped foot in that part of the castle – if hadn't made it clear by now, the castle is immense and really only the upper part of it was our home – and as we left the elevator, a change to it caught me more than a bit off guard.

The purple carpet running down the middle of the floor, the large crystal chandeliers that hung from the ceiling, the gilding that seemed to cover every edge and fill every corner; that was all the same – as much as we were miffed by it – but that was not what caught my eyes. Tapestries hung between the large arched windows along the hemispherical wall of the entrance. Woven into each was an image of my brother and I, and they seemed to tell the story of how I had found him in a cave what felt like a life time ago. They started at doors with me standing over his fallen form and ended near the stairs at the other end with the two of us standing side by side beneath the delta rune.

To say that I was surprised would have been an understatement. Questions ran through my mind – mainly who, when and why? With my brother and I cooped up in the castle as much as we were, it was no shock that things like this could slip beneath our notice, but the fact that mom and dad didn't mention something like this? Also, as strange as it was, I felt proud. Here was proof that monsters looked up to my brother as much as me, that they respected us equally. Seeing those tapestries made me happy. I remember nudging Chara in delight and loving the embarrassed look on his face. I remember thinking about how they were the first of many, that this was the beginning of our legacy.

I believe they're little more than ash, now.

My brother and I left the castle behind. It was hardly our first time out since we stopped training, but it had been long enough since we had left by the front gate that I had to stop and take it all in. A long run of stone steps extended down into the courtyards between the castle and the outer walls and a sea of colors met my eyes. The courtyards blossomed with life year-round, always teeming with life if not always with activity. Many monsters were still scared by the idea of getting too close to the barrier.

The outer wall was a bit of a misnomer, as there is barely anything to it that constitutes as a wall. Three story high towers connected by long archways of stone offered little obstruction to any trying to come or go and there were no raised gates or doors visible to ever make one believe that that would change. But there was a trick to it, my dad had told me. Within each of the towers was the raw materials necessary to seal off one of the openings, making a spell to do so easily doable by us boss monsters or any monster trained in the guard.

You see, our castle was designed a little atypically. Most castles were designed to keep unwelcome visitors out, but with the barrier being the only place for intrusion we had to fear, and with that being within the castle itself, this was designed to keep trespassers _in_. The odds of ever needing to do so were slim, but it's good to always be prepared.

Beyond the wall, the city buzzed with activity as usual. While the city itself didn't change much since we had moved there, there had definitely been a gradual shift of the infrastructure within. Many places of business now surrounded the castle and the population seemed to explode. At first we had thought it was just everyone moving closer to us or filling in from nearby caves, but all over the city it was the same. For the first time the city felt well and truly crowded. It was crowded to the point where there was talk of expansion, though where they thought they would expand was mystery to my brother and me. They could only really go up, and any thought to that was still utterly refuted.

We walked down the city's main avenue as quickly as we could, monsters waved as we passed or bowed out of our way. No one asked why we were out on our own, though several looked surprised by the fact, and I took a slight amount of enjoyment in that. We were headed all the way to the other end of the city to take the long way through Waterfall this time. Normally we would just take an elevator down through Hotland and shorten the trip a good deal, but it was not because we wanted to prolong our journey that we avoided that place.

There had been an accident in the lab. My brother and I didn't know much, most of it was kept from us, as usual, but we knew enough to know that we didn't really want to know more. Nearly every scientist had been discovered dead or near enough within. The look on peoples' faces whenever it was brought up said it had been a gruesome sight, and there had been very heated talks about shutting down both the lab and the core. As if that place didn't creep me out enough already.

The official report said the deaths were due to overuse of magic, a risk everyone was already well aware of when it came to what the monsters in the lab were doing, but it said nothing about how or why. I had a few guesses, and all of them made me feel sick. Not because of what I was imagining, but because all I could think about how they hindered my hopes for Chara and I.

I tried my best to shake all of that off as we made it to the city's edge. The last time we had been this far out, I remember the crowds thinning out to almost nothing, but now they filled the allies all the way to the wall of the cavern. Groups of kids played between the buildings and the laughter of parents trickled down from open widows above. It was good to see that the drone of the city was still happy one at least.

The trek through Waterfall was longer than I remembered, with us having to walk up through caves, across canyons connected by wooden bridges and pillars of stone. It took us nearly half a day just to make it up to the cliff that overlooked the capital, and at that point our journey had barely begun. By the time we made it to Snowdin, it was late enough that we decided to spend the night.

After walking around all day, I was glad for the cold, dry air of the forest. Chara on the other hand, seemed to be made as miserable by it as ever. He squinted against the chill and ignored me whenever I asked if he wished to borrow my coat.

In contrast to the city, Snowdin Town remained much the same both physically and characteristically. The quiet village that was little more than a single street could have been frozen in time for all that seemed to happen within it. We headed straight for the inn, wanting to get some rest and pick up again early tomorrow. On the way, I stopped abruptly, making Chara walk ahead before realizing I was no longer with him. "What's wrong?" He asked, turning to me.

And that was indeed the question I had asked myself. Something had just suddenly felt… off, but I had no idea what could have triggered it. I looked around. Nothing had changed. The same monsters still walked the dim street, waving as I glanced over them. I spun around my spot twice before I truly saw it: a tall house tucked a little ways back down the street, two stories high and made of a darker wood than the rest of the town, it was not something I remembered ever being there before. More interesting was how my eyes seemed to gloss over it not once, but three times, as if it didn't want to be seen. But now that I had seen it, it seemed to stick out as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. Who lived there? I wondered. When was it built?

Chara tapped me on the shoulder and broke me from my trance. "Are you alright?" he asked again.

I shook my head to clear it, sparing one last glance at the house. "Yeah, let's go." I told him.

At the inn, we were greeted by who I had first thought was the same rabbit I had quite literally run into that one time, but I realized that while they looked similar, there were a few differences. The main one being that the monster's fur was a light peach and not the full pink of the mother I had met.

She greeted us with a smile as we walked through the door into the warmth within. My brother let out a sigh of relief at that. "This is a surprise," she said warmly. "Welcome to the Snowed Inn, Your Highnesses. Are your parents here as well?"

"No, it's just us." I told her as I walked up to the counter. "And yes, they are aware of that fact." I joked.

She giggled behind her hand. "Oh, I would never imagine the two of you running away from home. Now, what can I do for the both of you?"

"One room, please." I said. "Just for the night. We're headed to Home."

The monster opened a book on the counter and wrote something into it. "On an adventure, are we?" she asked once she was finished.

I chuckled as well. "I guess you could call it that, though we're going strictly for official business."

The monster nodded. "Of course, of course. Well, I would be more than happy to put you up for the night."

When we got to our room, I threw my bag off my shoulder and began rummaging through it. Chara slammed himself down on the bed almost immediately, glad to be off of his feet. Before he could fall asleep, however, I pulled out the video camera I remembered to bring with us and went over to the bed. I hit record and pulled it up to his face. "Day one," I said aloud. "Our journey takes an unexpected turn as we find ourselves resting at the Snowed Inn on our first night. Chara, what did you think of the day?"

My question, mixed with the out-of-character monologue made my brother look up curiously. He rolled his eyes when he saw the camera pointed at him. "Did you really bring that with you?" He asked.

"Of course!" I exclaimed. "This is our first time doing anything like this, we have to remember it."

He stared at me for a moment longer. "Doesn't feel all that special to me." He said as he rolled over to his other side.

I walked around the bed and brought the camera closer to his face. "Don't be like that," I said teasingly, "Come on, say something!"

Chara looked at the camera and then looked at me. He gestured me closer with a finger and I leaned in slightly. He waved me closer still and I complied.

As quick as lightning, Chara reached over the screen on the side of the camera and hit the rewind button. I jumped back, but it was too late. "Chara!" I shouted. "Why did you do that? That overwrites the recording."

"I know," he said simply, closing his eyes again.

I frowned in annoyance. Setting down the camera, I jumped onto the bed, making Chara spring up a good foot in the air. He flailed as he came back down and landed face first in the blankets. Scrambling to his hands and knees he flashed a look of fury at me while I broke out laughing. My brother then lunged at me, nearly knocking us both off of the bed. He pulled me back up and flipped me over his shoulder. Knowing what to expect, I wrapped my legs around him and caught his hands in mine as he came at me once more. I threw him to the side and spun myself on top of him, laughing once more.

Chara bit my ear as it dangled in front of his face and I jumped back in shock. Then his weight slammed into me once more and I was pinned to the bed. Before either of us could do anything more, I watched a look of shock cross my brother's features, as if he just realized what we were doing. It had been so long since we play fought like that. Too long. I watched a whole realm of emotions flash through his eyes before he started to chuckle himself and I started to as well. Our laughter built into pure hysterics, and as it died down, Chara pressed his forehead against mine. Some shared understanding past between us that we wished that moment could last forever. The only thing that could have made it better was if I had gotten it on tape.

 

The following morning we were on our way again. As we were leaving, I remembered to ask the innkeeper about the house I saw yesterday. The rabbit monster's immediate reaction was not what I was expecting – she seemed to not know what I was talking about at first, and then it was like something clicked in her mind.

"Oh, _that_ house?" she said. "Is it new? I feel like it's been here forever… Either way, a couple of skeletons live there. They're nice, if a bit odd; they're almost never around though. I don't think anyone's had the chance to ask them what they do yet also."

_A couple of skeletons?_ I remember thinking. _I guess that isn't that weird. Monsters move around all the time, they're probably just from the city._ And that was the last I ever thought of it.

We raced through the forest in a matter of minutes, already behind and rejuvenated from out night at the inn, and were in the city well before lunchtime. A Loox, dressed in the council robes, met us by the mouth of the cave that led into the city. For a moment I felt a pang of guilt and hope they hadn't been waiting for us there all night, though the way its eye looked red, I suspected that was the case.

Despite its unexpected night away from home, the monster met us with a smile and a warm, "Welcome Home." I quickly apologized for delaying our arrival without sending word, which the Loox dismissed as a trivial matter. "I imagine you would like some time to settle in?" it went on.

"No, we've already put off things long enough." I told the monster. "I think we should probably get started with what we come here to do."

"Then by all means, right this way." The monster gestured for us to follow before leading us into the city. We stopped to drop off our bags before making our way down the main avenue to meeting hall. The Loox and I filled the intervening time with small talk.

"It was quite a surprise when we received word from the King and Queen that you would be coming alone." They said, "but I suppose it was only a matter of time before this day came. I remember when you were barely able to walk…"

I trailed off from the monster's ramblings and glanced over at Chara. He was looking off into the city as if he hardly recognized it. A group of monsters waved as we passed them by and Char waved back before going back to looking lost. I let him be.

The Loox continued to lead us through the city and into the Hall, up to what served as its office. To the back of the room was filled by a fairly large desk given the monster's size. It was covered almost completely by stacks of paper that almost hid the chair behind it. In the front of the room was a squat, oval table, a green upholstered couch resting against the walls to either side. The monster gestured for us to sit at one of them and then sat down across from us.

"So," I began, "How are things? Any problems we should know about right away?"

The monster leaned back on the couch and steepled its fingers before it. "There is surprisingly little, actually." It began. "It was one of the other reasons we were surprised that you were coming. This has been probably one of the most peaceful times in the city we've had since New Home was first being built."

"Really?" I questioned, my eyes widening in surprise. Chara put a hand under his chin as he seemed to consider something.

"Indeed. The only matter that springs to mind as unresolved is a price dispute over herbs in the market, which I hardly think is something you'd need worry yourselves over." The monster glanced away from me for a moment. "Please, Your Highness, that is all carefully organized."

I looked over to the desk to see my brother standing next to it, reaching out for one of the stacks of paper threatening to spill over its top. At the monster's warning, he let his hand drop. He gave a slight bow to the monster. "Of course, my apologies." It was funny watching him be so formal in these situations when he really didn't have to be. I would've told him he could stop, but it honestly worked for him. It was part of why I felt he was a natural and leading. He seemed to still be considering something. "Quite a bit of paperwork for there being no problems." He commented.

The Loox gave him a smile. "You'll find out one day that, problems or no, the amount of papers you need to read through and sign will never seem to change." I nodded; we already had at least some experience with that. My brother seemed unsatisfied though.

"It's just that I remember there being a number of disputes between different monsters. Nothing serious, of course, but enough that they would always seem to nitpick everything the other did and it would make assemblies drag on for hours. Could all of that really have just gone away?"

The monster thought for a moment before answering that time. "Well, I highly doubt that they have, or that they ever will, really. But they've quieted down at the very least, for the moment." My brother continued to stare at the Loox, who squirmed slightly beneath his gaze.

"Come on, Chara," I said, "It's not that hard to believe. This just means we have more time to enjoy ourselves."

My brother's gaze lingered for a moment longer before submitting. He sat down next to me again.

"Indeed," The Loox said, clapping its hands together. "Would either of you like some tea?"

 

That afternoon, we found ourselves sitting atop the meeting hall, like we used to, looking over the city. "That was easier than I thought," I mentioned absently. "It seems like the city doesn't have any problems at all."

"I get the feeling that's because mom and dad made sure there weren't any problems for us when we got here." My brother told me.

I looked to him kicking the air next to me before turning back to the city. "What makes you think that?"

"'Dear Councilmen, we are writing to inform you that we are sending our children to Home to act as our representatives. Do _not_ overwhelm them.' Signed and sealed by the King and Queen of Monsters."

I looked back at Chara to see him holding a piece of paper. Shocked, I snatched it from his hand. "Did you steal this from their desk?" I asked.

Chara shrugged. "I mean _technically_ it followed me out of the room."

I smacked him upside the head with the paper. "Magic does not excuse theft!" I lectured. I then unfolded the paper and read it for myself, letting out a groan as I finished. "Have I ever told you I'm sick of being babied?"

"Only every day," my brother answered.

I refolded the paper and put it in my pocket. As much as I wanted to ball it up and toss it in frustration, I still had to give it back. "Well, if they're not going to tell us what's wrong in order to do or jobs, what's the point of even being here?"

"We could always ask ourselves." My brother suggested and I caught on to his meaning instantly.

Within the hour, we were wandering the streets of the city, first through the market district and then spreading out from there, striking up conversation with everyone we passed. Each time eventually steering the conversation from their questions about us and the rest of the Underground to the topic of current events and what's been going on for them. Their stories were often much the same.

"Not much has happened at all since you were last here, Your Highnesses, just the same old problems and worries that will never truly be solved. The only thing that everyone seems to be talking about beyond that is whether or not we should abandon the city in some way, shape or from. Seems there's just too few of us here now to keep the city running. Parts of it are already falling apart along the outskirts." This was often followed by the monster's stance on the matter, typically either aghast at the idea that abandoning the city could even be suggested or regrettably in agreement with the notion.

It was usually said in a cursory matter. The significance of what they were suggesting did not seem to register with them. But as we talked to more and more monsters and they all said the same, my worry grew. Eventually my brother took notice.

"What's the problem?" he asked. "Monsters wanting to leave is nothing new."

"It's not that," I told him. "It's the city."

"That it's falling apart? That's what happens when things are abandoned. Big deal."

I stopped my brother as we were walking down the street and looked around to see if anyone was close enough to hear before saying, "It's a bigger deal than you think, Chara. This city was made with magic, every building, every street. Because of that, it should stand forever, but it's not. Tied off spells aren't supposed to deteriorate, but this city is the first thing monsters have made to remain for as long as it has, and now it's starting to tell us that what we thought was one of the fundamental laws of magic is wrong. This could change everything."

My words seemed to have little impact on him. "It's not that surprising to me," he said.

I blinked. "What do you mean?"

He shrugged again. "Magic is all just knots of energy being pulled tight by whoever wields it. Tied of spells are no exception, and eventually they fray." He looked around the city, seeing that which I could never see. "Some are in better shape than others, they may last for centuries still, but they're all the same. I just thought you knew."

I considered my brother's word and decided that they did not change the importance of the matter. This was serious, probably the most serious thing to be discovered since we learned what it would take to destroy the barrier. "Why would they hide this from us?" I asked.

My brother tapped me on the head with the letter he had somehow managed to swipe from my pocket. "Let's find out." he suggested.

 

We stormed back into the Loox's office as soon as we reached it. I still had the courtesy to at least knock, but Chara just walked right in afterwards anyway. The monster sitting behind the desk started, scattering the papers it had been holding into the air. They recovered quickly, however. "Your Majesties," it said nervously. "Did you forget something?"

"No, but you did." I said as I slammed the folded letter down on the table, seal facing up so there could be no doubt what it was. The monster went white.

"W-wait a moment," it stammered, "please understand, I was simply doing as I was told."

"I know," I told them. "I don't blame you for that."

"Unfortunately, the monsters in the city didn't get the same letter." Chara added.

"The city is falling apart?" I questioned, cutting right to it. "Even if you were doing your duty, how could you keep something that important from us? At the very least my parents need to know about this!" I was surprised to find out how angry I was. I caught my next words, waiting to see how the councilman.

"They do," the Loox somberly. The monster lowered itself back into the seat behind its desk before going on. "They've known about it for some time."

"Why keep it from us then?" I asked.

"Because there is nothing anyone can do about it." The monster said simply. "Once a spell has been tied off, the only one who can change it or even look at it is the one who cast it, and all of the monsters who built this city aside from the Queen are long gone. And she's already done all she could.

"We decided to keep this from you because we didn't want you to feel like your task was impossible from the get go. We had been warned that your moods have… fragile, lately."

My anger died in my throat. Of course, I should have thought of that. Tied off spells were locked off from all but the wielder just like any other magic. But then, I remembered something. My head snapped back up to the monster fast enough to make him jump again, but I had nothing else to say to them.

I walked out of the office without another word, my brother on my heels. When he caught up, he gave me a concerned look. "The spells, do you think you could change them?" I asked. I had remembered a time when my brother first came into my life, of when he was able to snatch a spell from my control as if it were his to begin with.

Chara seemed to consider this for a moment. "I don't know." He said at last. "They're pretty complicated, but maybe."

I stopped in the hallway and turned to him. "Will you try?" I must have looked more intense than I thought, a flash of nervousness crossed my brother's features. After a moment, he nodded. "Alright, let's go."

 

We picked a building just on the edge of the populated part of the city. According to Chara, it was one of the closest to coming apart completely and that, apparently, would make it easier for him to try to take hold of it. I sat on the steps at the front while my brother worked, looking to me like he was just staring at a wall. I wished I could see what the world was like through his eyes. I wasn't envious as much as I was simply curious. What could be learned about magic with that ability? Oh well, Chara would have to be the one to do it; it was his gift, not mine.

My brother let out a breath suddenly and began to pant before raising his hand to the wall to the wall and becoming silent and still once more. I hoped beyond hope that this would work. Of course, if the buildings did fall and we ever needed more we could simply make them, but the implication that magic would one day simply deteriorate and there was just nothing anyone could do about it would weigh heavy on everyone's hearts if it became common knowledge.

Chara let out another breath and I turned in time to see him crash to the ground. I was over him in an instant. "I can't," he said before I could ask if he was alright. Sweat ran down his face and dampened his shirt. Had that really taken so much effort from him? "I can't do it." He repeated through labored breaths.

"What do you mean?" I asked as I helped him to his feet.

Chara leaned on me heavily as he answered. "I tried to pull it to me but… whatever it's tied to… I felt like I was going to be ripped away. I'm sorry Asriel, I can't do it."

I didn't quite understand what he was talking about and I wasn't sure I ever would, but I wasn't about to make him try again. The fear in his eye as he looked up at the building made me feel sick for ever asking him in the first place. "That's okay," I told him, "It was a longshot anyway." I smiled, but that didn't seem to make him feel better.

"Prince Asriel?" A voice called. I looked up the street to see a monster running up to us. "I'm glad I was able to find you two." It went on as it reached us. "A few monsters are throwing a party to celebrate your visit and we were wondering if you would come."

I looked back to Chara and gave him another smile. "Forget about this. Let's go have some fun.

 

As it turned out, 'a few monsters' was actually half of the city. They filled the street more densely than in New Home. Streamers were strewn across buildings, balloons and spells that cast glittering light filled the air. We arrived just as it seemed to hit full swing. It had been so long since we had done something like this though, that we weren't sure what to do. We stood around awkwardly while talking to various monsters for a short while, before drinks were suddenly thrust into our hands. I tried to turn it down, but the monster that gave them to us insisted. "You're old enough to have a drink or two by now." They said with a wink before waddling off, clearly having had a few already themselves.

I looked down at the drink for a moment and thought, why not? With how the day had gone, who cared if I was a little reckless? Chara seemed to share the sentiment. He shrugged, we clinked glasses and tilted our heads back.

The next thing I remember was waking up back at my old home, missing not only my shirt, but my brother as well. I spent the better part of about twenty minutes just trying to get to my feet.

As a frame of reference, monsters get hangovers differently to humans. Instead of nausea and headaches, we develop this disconnect between our minds and our bodies. There's this temporary delay between thought and action, and it's quite the struggle to overcome before it goes away. So for twenty minutes I dealt with, move leg, _count_ , my leg moves; move arm, _count_ , my arm moves; until finally I adjusted enough to be able to walk.

I first went looking for our bags. The food mom had packed for us would get rid of my discoordination instantly. I found them in the hallway, torn open with several things strewn about. Thankfully the food was fine.

I unwrapped a sandwich and wolfed it down before rummaging for a new shirt. I noticed, next to the bag, the camera I had brought with us. Perhaps…

Sitting with my back against the wall, I turned it on. There were several new videos. I swallowed and hit the first one. Most of it was just blur and noise. For a brief second, it focused on my brother. He was still standing in the street where the party was going on and smiling at me.

The video ended and I played the next. It showed me standing on a table in a building, monsters were gathered at my feet and I seemed to be telling a story of some sort. I couldn't tell what I was saying over the laughter of the other monsters though. I watched myself stumble around for a few minutes, acting out god only knew what before the camera spun around to show my brother. He stuck his tongue out at the lens before the video ended.

I played the next. The screen was dark, and I could hear breathing. "Note to self," I my voice said suddenly. "Humans are sneaky." I then shouted for my brother before that video ended as well. I felt my face get hot, and I was glad I was the only one there to see any of that. Then I remembered that all of that had actually happened, and I became very reluctant to leave that house ever again.

I skipped to the last video, certain I would not be able to handle any more than that. It began with the camera crashing to the floor, likely in the spot I had picked it up in. My brother and I walked in from behind. I had already lost my shirt. Chara was holding me up with my arm around his shoulder. "There you go," he said as he put me down against the far wall and sat down next to me.

My head rolled on my neck and I laughed. "That was fun!" I said a little loudly.

Chara smiled. "Mmhmm." He agreed. My brother seemed to be in much better shape than I was.

"You know what?" I went on. "Despite everything that happened today, I'm glad we came." I snuggled up next to Chara and closed my eyes. "It sucks that we couldn't fix the city, but it's okay. After all, nothing can last forever."

I felt myself stiffen as I saw my brother do the same. His head slowly turned to me as I rested against him, having no idea what I just said. My brother then stared at nothing for a moment before shrugging me off of him and standing up. "Come on," he said, "let's get you to bed."

"But I'm not tired!" I argued as he lifted me up and carried me off down the hallway. There was a few minutes of silence, and then my brother walked back onto the screen. He stopped and looked back down the hall before walking away. The video went on until it ran out of tape. I stopped it and began to delete all of them.

Putting the camera down, I left and began to look for my brother. I found him at the top of the stairs leading to the city, looking out over it as if he didn't really see it. I sat down next to him and waited for him to say something. He didn't.

"That was some night, huh?" I said, unwilling to suffer the silence a moment longer.

"Quite," he said curtly without turning.

I reached for his hand, but reconsidered and pulled back. "Chara, I'm sorry for what I said. I didn't mean it."

"You did though," he stated.

I nearly choked. "Chara…"

"It's okay, I understood what you were trying to say." He looked at me at last, sad resignation in his ruby eyes. "You're right, nothing in this world can last forever." He turned back to the city, this time taking it all in. "Not as it is now." He finished.

I wasn't sure what to say, but I wasn't given the chance. "You know, I kind of miss the sky in New Home, even if it is fake." He went on, changing the subject. And there I saw my chance to cheer him up.

"Do you want to see it?" I asked him.

"See what?" he asked back.

"The sky." I told him. "There's one place in the Underground that it reaches."

 

I ran through the catacombs ahead of my brother, leading him on. Its twists and turns were as familiar to me then as they were before, and I had no trouble maintaining a quick pace, trying to keep ahead of Chara's impatience. When we reached the end we kept going, out into the caves above. I cast a spell to light our way though I barely needed it there either.

Eventually we made it to the place where I first found Chara all that time ago. The cavern was bathed in the midmorning sun from the hole high above our heads. It filtered into the cave and revealed a sight that made our breath catch.

Everywhere we looked, growing over the ground, the walls, the ancient columns, were these golden flowers. They were all in full bloom and seemed to shine in the light. I had never seen their like in the Underground before. It was beautiful. "Where did they come from?" I whispered as though speaking any louder would somehow shatter the sight.

Instead of responding, Chara began to laugh, softly at first but growing louder as it went. I looked to him worriedly. It was not at all an out of the ordinary laugh, but I still didn't quite understand it. Before I could ask him, he left my side and ran to the center of the room to stand in the light. He spread his arms and closed his eyes as he began to spin before crashing down into the flowers, scattering a number of petals into the air.

I walked over to join him, and no sooner than I had was I pulled to the ground as well. I scrambled to sit up in my surprise. "What's gotten into you?" I asked as he began to stick flowers in my fur. He didn't answer, just continued to laugh to himself. "Oh, so that's how it is, huh?" I said before tackling him.

We played, chasing each other around the cave, until the light began to tilt the other way as it fell onto us and then we both collapsed back in the center, trying to catch our breath. "So, I take it you're happy I brought you here?" I asked once I was able to.

"Yeah," Chara answered, his head next to mine.

We looked up at the sky above us, like a blue jewel embedded in the rock, or and ocean impossibly clear and deep. I felt like I could lie there forever, but unfortunately I felt hunger beginning to take me and I had forgotten to bring food with us. I had never expected we would stay as long as we had.

I looked over to Chara to see him looking at another one of the flowers in his hand again. "You must really like those flowers." I commented.

"Yeah," he said again.

"Why?" It seemed an innocent enough question.

My brother put his hand back down to his side and his smile slipped. "You wouldn't believe it."

"I would if you told me." I reasoned.

Chara was silent a moment more before beginning. "Before I fell down here, the few times I would consider to be good, I always saw these exact flowers before things got better." He explained. "They're my sign. I saw them right before I came here. That's why I decided to jump." My brother sat up from the ground and looked down at me. "Do you believe that?"

"I guess?" I admitted. He chuckled.

"It's okay if you don't," he told me, "because I believe it." He took one last look at the sky. "Things will get better. Trust me."

 

After heading back and getting some food into us, we spent the second half of the day waiting to see if something happened that might require our attention, but the city stayed quite. Thankfully no one talked about my behavior the night before, though I suspected it would spread eventually. Whether it would make it all the way to New Home… I didn't even want to think about that.

Afterwards, we returned to our old house and packed up to be ready to be off first thing in the morning. We decided to stay out of the city for dinner that time. Chara sat beneath the tree in our old front yard which now had a growing pile of leaves at its base. What remained on the branches looked thin indeed. I joined him, sandwich in one hand, camera in the other and got his attention.

"Howdy, Chara, smile for the camera!" He looked up from the book he had taken with him and did smile, though it was one of his creepy smiles. "No, silly, just a normal smile." His face softened, but that smile did not last and his eyes went back to the ground. "Hey, what's wrong?"

My brother remained silent long enough that I nearly asked him again. "Do you remember how we messed up during Mom and Dad's anniversary?" He asked.

I actually had to think about it for a moment. "Oh, yeah, I remember. When we tried to make butterscotch pie, right? The recipe asked for cups of butter but we put in buttercups instead."

"Do you remember what happened?" Chara asked next.

I chuckled dryly. "Yeah, those flowers got him really sick. I felt so bad. We made mom really upset. I should have just laughed it off like you did…" Chara was still looking at the ground. "That was almost a year ago now." I added. "Where are you going with this?"

"Turn off the camera." He told me.

"Turn off the…?"

"Please, Asriel." My brother looked up at me and I could tell he was serious.

"Okay." I said as I stopped the recording. I went over to sit next to him, placing the camera at my side. "So why are you bringing all of this up now?"

"Remember what we were told about the barrier, about what could cross it and what couldn't?"

"Yeah," I answered, not quite sure why he had asked. "Chara, what are you talking about?

He continued to look at the leaves at his feet. "Someone with both the soul of a human and a monster can leave, right?"

"That's just a theory." I told him. "There's never been a way to actually test that." Then it dawned on me. "Wait, Chara, you aren't suggesting…"

My brother nodded his head slowly. It was as if the motion made him realize what he was saying as well, lent it weight, and gave it power that once said could not be taken back. "The flowers should make it so you don't have to do anything." He said, and it was enough that there could be no doubt what he was proposing.

I practically leapt to my feet. "Chara, that's crazy!"

"I've been thinking about it since yesterday," he went on as if I hadn't spoken. "It has to work, and it's the answer to all our problems."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. "How can you think that? You're talking about killing yourself!"

"How else would you be able to take my soul?" Like it was already a foregone conclusion.

I stammered for something to say. All I could think about was how I must have failed again. I thought I was finally able to create a world where Chara was happy, but still… I wasn't ready to give up, even if he was. "We are not doing that!" I shouted at last. "We'll find another way!"

"Asriel, think for a second." My brother went on. "The scientists already tried everything else, and look what they got for it. The answer to the barrier is not on this side, it's up there and we can get it. It's the only way."

"Who cares?" I practically screamed at him. "Why do you want to do this? Why can't go on pretending like it doesn't exist and just being happy together?"

"The barrier is always on everyone's mind." He said softly. "Every day I hear someone talking about it at least once."

"I don't understand…"

"Admit it Asriel, even you wish the barrier was destroyed."

Chara's words seemed to drain the life out of me. I felt numb, and sat back down next to him. "Of course I do, everyone does. But we are all content to wait until a solution comes that _doesn't_ involve anyone else sacrificing themselves!"

"I won't be dead, not really." He stated calmly. "We'll be together, forever. Like we talked about."

I felt the world dim. "Chara…"

"I want to help monsters live in a world where they can be happy without a seed of fear and sorrow always at the back of their minds. I want them to live in a world with the sun and the sky. They deserve it."

My brother's words made the fire return to mine. "You deserve to live in that world too!"

He remained calm. "I will, Asriel, and I will see it through your eyes. Just like I always wanted." I was speechless. This was something Chara really wanted to do, and I could tell nothing would change his mind. "Trust me, Asriel, this will work."

"I do trust you." I told my brother. "I just…" My eyes fell on the camera. I hit the button to start recording. "I don't like this idea, Chara."

My brother must have seen me look away. "Are you crying?" he asked.

"Wha?" I stammered. "No! I'm not… big kids don't cry."

I tucked my knees to my chin. I certainly wanted to cry. I wanted this to all be a dream and to go back to a world where I at least thought my brother was happy, but he kept going on.

"We do this, we go to the surface, take enough souls to destroy the barrier and create a new world for everyone. What do you say?"

I squeezed my eyes shut and shook my head. There was a moment of silence between us.

"And what if I told you I would do it anyway?"

I looked up at my brother in disbelief, and he looked back at me with a flat stare. "Chara…"

"We'll be strong, Asriel. Strong enough to make all of our dreams come true." He placed his hand on top of mine. I could tell how much he wanted this; it was as plain as the light in the cave with the flowers. A thought came to me: I had gone to so many other lengths for my brother, why not this?

I almost immediately rejected it outright. So much could go wrong; nothing like this had ever been done in recorded history, and the myth around it only made it worse. But… at the same time, I realized in that moment that my brother could never be happy in this world. I had tried everything to make it so and nothing had worked. This was the only chance I had left. I had no choice.

"Yeah, you're right." I told him. The words felt like sand in my throat.

Chara seemed to not believe it himself. "You don't doubt me?"

I shook my head. "No, I'd never doubt you." I embraced my brother for what already felt like the last time. I didn't want to let go. "We'll be strong." I echoed. "We'll free everyone." I felt like I was going to be sick.


	9. The Last Mistake

"I'll go get the flowers."

Those words were never meant to carry as much misery as they did for me that day. Flowers were meant to spread happiness and affection. In fields, they give color to the world, an accent that heightens an already tranquil place. As gifts, they let loved ones know they are in our hearts. They were meant to be symbols of peace and love.

They were supposed to say that brighter days lie ahead.

Though, as I now understand it, humans often bring flowers to funerals. They surround their passed loved ones in the blossoms and even bury them with them at times. In that case, I suppose there is a measure of irony to be appreciated with how everything turned out, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

As I went down to the courtyards in the lower part of the castle early that morning, all flowers did was remind me of my failures. There was no denying what my brother was trying to do, no way of masking behind another intention. Chara was trying to kill himself.

For two years I tried to make my brother happy, tried to turn the Underground into a place he could call home, to show him that he had a family now and to help put the demons of his past behind him. But I had failed on all accounts, and this is my punishment. From the very first day I have only ever miss stepped, only made things worse. And now it all led to this.

In my worst nightmares I had never imagined something like this would happen, and I often caught myself thinking, _how?_ But as I gathered the flowers and tried to stave off tears, I pushed that thought aside whenever it reared its ugly head. Because it didn't matter. In the end, it was the same no matter how you looked at it.

Chara was going to kill himself.

And I was helping him do it.

When I made it back up to our room – stalking through the upper floors of the castle in darkness so my parents would not wake and see what we were doing – with as many of the flowers as I could find, I found Chara much the same way I had left him. He sat in the middle of the floor, staring at his hand thoughtfully, like it might reveal the secrets of the universe to him. The lights were off, and for a moment I just stood and watched him. He was so absorbed in his thoughts that he had not seen me come in. His eyes seemed to shimmer behind his fallen strands of hair as he was hunched over like that. Had he always looked so fragile? Even when I had seen him break down into pieces, Chara always looked to me like anything that damaged him would only ever be momentary. My brother had always been stronger than me, tougher. To me, he was something that I knew would always still be there, even if the rest of the world fell away. But now that feeling was gone, and what was left was this overwhelming desire to protect him from harm from a world that could so easily sweep him away from me. Was this how other monsters saw me?

I walked over and sat across from him, placing the bundle of flowers between us, and Chara came back to the present. He looked down at the pile and then up at me. I looked away. My hands clenched on top of my knees to try to stop from shaking.

"You think this will be enough?" was the first thing he asked. By comparison to how I felt, I would have said he sounded excited that this was finally happening.

I shrugged. It was much less than we had used in the pie. I figured that since Chara was much smaller than my father that we wouldn't need as many. I would have said as much, but I was afraid that if I opened my mouth I wouldn't be able to close it again. Then I'd start suggesting how much I didn't like this, that we should try something else or just stop all together. But I couldn't. I had already promised to go along with this. I was not about to start breaking that now. My brother nodded though, seeming to have the same train of thought as me.

He picked up one of the flowers and turned it over in his hand, examining it. I continued to look away, unable to watch, but my brother pulled me back. "Asriel?" he said, drawing my eyes to his. He held the flower as if offering to me. "This might not work on me the same way it did on your dad," he said. "I don't know what will happen but…" he trailed off, and for second I thought that I should speak up, that this was my chance to persuade him. But it lasted only the briefest moment, and when he looked back up, his face was full of determination once more. His eyes glowed in the dim light of our room, glowed more fiercely than his soul. "If it's bad, I need you to promise me, Asriel, that no matter what happens you will not let me stop. No matter what I say, no matter what I do, once we start we can't back out. Do you promise?"

At first, I didn't understand. It almost sounded like he didn't think he could go through with it. If that was the case, why was he trying at all? His gaze did not waver though. Whatever he thought would happen after, there would be no convincing him not to do it now. But, why? Why ask me this? For my dad, once he was done being sick, he was bedridden for the rest of the day, but that was only because he was exhausted. Mom had said that if he kept the flowers down they would have killed him, but she never said how. Did Chara think it would be worse than just feeling sick? My doubts resurfaced, but I naïvely pushed them back down.

I nodded my promise to my brother, and he nodded back. With one more look at the flowers he began shoving them in his mouth. I stared at the floor, my teeth clenched. This was it, I thought. I expected the moment to have more weight, more ceremony, but my brother simply kept devouring them. When he was about halfway through the pile, I heard him begin to choke. I looked up just as Chara broke into a coughing fit and I ran out to the kitchen to get him a glass of water. He drank it greedily as I returned to the room then glanced down at the other half of the pile. "I think that should be enough," he said. He sounded strained. My guess was from all of the coughing.

"How do you know?" I asked foolishly. The second the words were out of my mouth I expected him to start wolfing down more of them. But he just looked up at me and said nothing. He didn't need to; his face said he had no doubt.

"Hide the rest," he said instead. "Just in case."

I hid the rest of the flowers in my dresser before sitting across from my brother again. Once more he looked… considerate. "How do you feel?" I asked and immediately wanted to punch myself again.

"Fine, for now," he said almost casually, like we weren't discussing the fact that he had just poisoned himself. "Maybe it'll be quick after all." He sounded hopeful at that. I found myself hoping so as well. At that point, it was the most I could ask for. Chara reached out and held my arm. "Remember Asriel," he said, seeing the look I must have had on my face. "I'm not leaving you. Soon we'll be together forever. This is only the beginning."

I nodded. I believed my brother, but I still didn't like it. Perhaps I would feel better when this was all over; once I could be certain. "If you feel fine for now, why don't we do something?" I suggested. Chara looked at me like I had two heads. "Do you really want to sit here all day waiting?" I explained as I stood up. "We should still have fun while we have the chance. Pretty soon it'll be all work, right?" I figured that might get him moving, but he looked away.

"I don't know," he said softly.

I knelt in front of him and grabbed his hands. "We should at least remember the days like this." I told him. "And I think our last memory shouldn't of us sitting in my room. Let's try to have some fun together like this. One more time." It was enough. He nodded, though somewhat reluctantly and I pulled him to his feet.

 

It didn't take him long to get into it. Any chance Chara had to show off he always took. So as the sky brightened on the surface and its light was mirrored over the city beyond the castle, Chara and I ran through the halls of our home like we had so many times before, and for the moment I could put trouble behind me.

"Stop, you miscreant!" I shouted after Chara as he rounded a corner a little ways ahead of me. Running through those corridors of pale gray stone had never been as comforting for me as they had in that moment. The polished tile beneath my feet, the light streaming in from the narrow windows; all of this severed to help prove to myself that this was still reality. And at that moment that was all I cared about. I soaked in every detail, trying to burn the image into my mind so it could drown out all of my sorrow and all of my guilt.

We were playing a variation of tag and hide and seek. One of us would pretend to be a mischievous monster who was running away from the Guard and the other would pretend to be the guardsman. I must have been chasing after my brother for a while. I was beginning to feel tired. Even if it had been a long time since we were training, one of the perks of it was that the strength gain never left you. But it still wasn't enough to best my brother. He almost always won at this game, or any like it, really. He probably used magic to cheat, but I would never say that out loud. It's not like I could ever prove it either. Those red lines caused by his magic are hard to catch. It hardly mattered to me anyway. If Chara's antics kept this game going longer, I would hardly fault him for it.

When I rounded the corner, that surreal vision I had foolishly mistaken for reality shattered. I felt my body grow cold. Chara hadn't continued to run ahead, he lay in the middle of the hallway, head down and unmoving. I ran to him as fast I could and picked him up in my arms. His eyes were closed. I tried to shake him awake. "Chara?" I said weakly. I could already feel tears beginning to well up.

_Was this it?_ I thought. _Did it just happen like that?_ My fears were pushed aside as Chara's eyes slowly fluttered open. Then he jolted upright. He sounded like he was biting back a scream as he held his stomach. He flipped out of my arms and on to his hands and knees, continuing to sound like he was in intense pain and looking like he was about to be sick. I went over to him again but he pushed me away. His pained moaning turned into panting, and soon he had calmed down enough that I tried to reach out to him again. "Chara?"

"I'm fine," he said a little too quickly. He certainly didn't look fine. His face was still pale, sweat beaded on his brow that made the ends of his hair stick to it. His arms shook as he leaned on them as well.

"Maybe we should go back…" I suggested.

"I said I'm fine." He maintained ardently.

I was ready to argue, but I knew it would be no use. Chara had made up his mind, and we all know how easy it to change that by now. "Well, then I don't think we should keep running around at the very least." Chara nodded agreement, admitting, at least, to that. "Maybe just a walk then." I helped my brother get up. He leaned on me heavily until he was on his feet again, but then he seemed to recover quickly.

We walked to the top of the outer wall hand in hand. It was a slow pace. I didn't want Chara collapsing again, not yet anyway. Though, I wasn't sure if it was me setting the pace or him. He certainly didn't complain, and neither did I. Anything to prolong this.

When we got to the wall, we sat on the parapet looking out at the city. When we had first moved into the castle, I remember thinking that it would never feel like Home. It was too big, too full. And yet as I looked out over the tops of the buildings that day, watching monsters stream about below and fly overhead, I realized that at some point this place had sunk into my soul the same way Home had without me even realizing it. And now I was going to leave it behind, at least for a while. And, perhaps one day, we all would. I found that idea made me sad. I didn't want to see a place as wonderful as that be abandoned, for any reason. "Do you think we'll be able to build a city like this on the surface?" I asked Chara.

"Hundreds." He said simply.

I looked at him wide-eyed. "There's _that_ much room on the surface?" he nodded. I tried to picture it in my head, tried to make the stone walls of the cavern that surrounded New Home fade away to be replaced by open air that stretched as far as the eye could see. Soon that dream would be a reality. I found myself looking forward to it, strangely enough, but I still wished we could get it in some other way. In my dreams, Chara and I stood together as we stepped out onto the surface. Even in my mental image at that moment, in my head Chara and I sat together just as we did now. This other way just wouldn't be the same.

I looked at Chara once more. He looked tired, I realized. I felt tired too. Based on the color of the sky, it was almost midday, and I had barely slept the night before on top of all of the running around we did. It was past time to recuperate. "Hungry?" I asked.

Chara looked down for a moment before answering. "Sure," he said.

 

"What do you think it will be like, when we're together?" I asked Chara as we sat at a bench in one of the courtyards near the back of the castle. It was usually more private than the ones upfront. My parents were both awake by the time we had gotten back, and I ate hungrily at the lunch my mom made for us. Chara had wanted to wait outside while I she made it, afraid she would find out something was wrong. She had asked if anything was and I told her not to worry, but it was not easy. "Do you think we'll jinx a lot or something like that?" I joked between bites. I had found many questions popping into my head in regards to our first trip to the surface. We had never really talked about it before, mostly because I didn't want to. But now, there was no avoiding really, so I figured I might as well indulge that train of thought. My brother shrugged his response. "Well, I hope I'll at least get to hear your voice." I went on. "If we really do completely become one person, that won't be very fun…" Seeing that Chara wasn't going to say anything, I decided to ask something else. "What should we do first, when we get to the surface?"

My brother thought for a second, looking through the ground as he did. "There's something I want you to see when we get there. Before we do anything else."

I blinked at him. "Is it important?" I asked. He nodded. "What is it?"

"Something you need to see" was all he would say after.

My eyes dropped to his lunch spread out on the bench between us. It was untouched. "You're not going to eat?"

He shook his head. "I don't think it's a good idea. It might heal me."

Chara had a point; I hadn't thought about that. But still… "You should at least eat a little. If it's taking this long, you don't want to add hunger pain on top of everything else."

My brother looked ready to protest, but then looked down at his own lunch and picked up a half a sandwich. He held it out before him for a moment, hesitating, before finally taking a bite. You would have thought he had tried to eat some kind of stinky cheese for the face he made. Then, when he tried to swallow, he suddenly doubled over into another coughing fit. The sandwich hit the ground as his hands went to his mouth. I reached him as he fell off the bench and onto his knees, grabbing him to help him back up.

It lasted more than a minute, sounding worse and worse as time went on. It got to the point where it stopped sounding like coughing and sounded like Chara's body was trying to tear itself apart. Finally, he seemed to calm down. As he pulled his hands away from his mouth, I saw that they were covered in a red liquid. Blood, I remembered. That was not good.

Chara's breath came short and shallow and it sounded like he was trying to breathe through a paper bag. He looked even paler. "Chara…?" I tried.

"I'm… fine," he choked on the words, going into another coughing fit. More blood splattered to the ground, and then my brother collapsed.

It took me a moment to realize I was shouting, screaming denial as I held my brother's limp shoulders, and when I did, I quickly tried to get control of myself. Tears were streaming down my face from what I had just seen, but there was nothing to do about that now. I gathered Chara's fallen form into my arms and ran home.

 

"Do not worry, Chara," my mom said as she held her hands over my brother. A soft golden glow enveloped them as she tried to heal him. There was no avoiding it. I had run home without thinking, Chara held to my chest just as I had the first day I found him. I had pleaded for help before I could stop myself. The shock of that moment in the courtyard had broken down all of my resilience to the thoughts of doubt and fear that permeated my mind. And in that moment of weakness I may have ruined everything. I felt guilty, but the thought did not make me sad. "You will be better soon enough." She tried to reassure him.

Chara had woken up again after I carried him back. He had refused to go home for this very reason, but he didn't have the strength to stop it. My brother stared at the ceiling while my mother worked. It was hard to tell if he looked pained or angry.

Letting out a sigh, my mom pulled her hands away. "There," she said. "Now all we have to do is wait." She smiled as she stood and turned to leave the room, looking back as she stood in the doorway. Sadness and concern were all that filled her eyes, and her smile slipped for the briefest instant. A moment after, the door closed behind her. I went over and pulled it open a crack. "There is nothing I can do." I head mom say softly in the hallway. "There is no visible damage. Healing magic will not work." She sniffed. "I don't know what to do. Oh god, Asgore, my child is dying!" I heard my mom start to cry, and then I heard my father's voice.

"He is a human, Tori, you cannot forget that. Our child may pull through yet. Do not give up hope."

I moved away from the doors and back to my brother. "Get the rest of the flowers." He told me once I was standing over the bed. His voice was barely above a whisper. Blood trickled down the side of his mouth as he spoke. "It can't end like this."

I shook my head. "The healing didn't do anything, mom said herself. You should know that."

But he wouldn't let it go. "Still, just in case."

I was reluctant to get the flowers from the dresser. I looked out into the hallway first, incase my mom and dad came back. The hallway was empty for the moment. I dropped the flowers on the bed like they were covered in thorns, pricking at my skin, infecting me with whatever ailed Chara simply by touching them. My brother jumped on them. Seeming to find some reserve of energy in that moment, he sat up and began devouring the flowers like a mad man. It did not take him long to start choking again, but this time he pushed through it. Tears began to stream down his cheeks as they did mine. I don't think I had stopped crying once since I had brought him back.

"There," he said once the last flower was gone. The act seemed like it took monumental effort from how his voice sounded. "It's done." He broke out into another fit. It was loud enough that it had my parents come back running. It no longer sounded like coughing to me at all, just the tearing of flesh and the wet splatter of blood. My mom and dad helped him back down onto the bed and tried to get him to drink water. I stood by my own bed, watching all of this, helpless.

Eventually he settled down and they left, saying they would be back to check up on him soon. I continued to stand like a statue. The light was off now – mom had suggested Chara try to get some rest – and it felt as if the shadows were closing in on me. "I didn't want them to see this." Chara said weakly.

"They deserve to know at least something." I said, trying to explain why I brought him back.

"They think I'm dying." Chara said.

"You are dying." I told him.

"No I'm not, not really."

It was growing harder and harder to convince myself of that. It certainly seemed like Chara was dying. And it certainly felt like it.

 

As night came, Chara still lived, and he was in agony. I lay awake in my bed, listening to him moan in pain, no longer able to hold it in. Between the groans, I could hear him sob and twist in his bed. I was gripping my blanket and my pillow tight enough that my claws were making tears in it. There was nothing I could do to help. I had tried, and Chara just pushed me away. Mom and dad had come several times to check on him several times, but they often left quickly. There was nothing they could do either, and it didn't seem like it was going to stop any time soon.

Eventually, I could take no more. I went to stand by his bed, to at least show him I was still there. I took his hand in mine as he twisted in pain. It felt hot. His whole body was covered in sweat; his clothes were soaked through with it. Chara gripped my hand tightly as he found it. He looked up at me. His eyes said that he was in even more pain than he showed.

"Asriel," he breathed, forming the word around panting breath. "It hurts so much. I can't take it anymore."

I squeezed my eyes shut at his words. "I'm sorry," I said. My voice shook.

"Please, Asriel, make it stop," he pleaded. "I didn't know it would be like this. It's not worth it. Please!"

I shook my head without opening my eyes. "I can't," I told him.

"Please, Asriel, do something! It hurts!"

"I can't." I said again.

I knew what my brother was asking. It was hard enough to lose him like this. I couldn't do it with my own hands. Even if he was in agony, I couldn't bring myself to lose him any faster than I had to.

"Then heal me." He tried next. "We'll try to find another way tomorrow." I shook my head again. "Why not?"

"It won't work." I reminded him.

"Don't worry. I can help guide the weaves with my power. You don't need to see what's wrong. It'll work." I shook my head again. "Asriel, why are you doing this?" he whimpered.

"You made me promise…" I mouthed the words more so than spoke them.

"Forget the promise!" Chara shouted. "I can't take this anymore!"

My head turned back and forth on its own now. "I can't, Chara. I can't. Please, don't make me."

Chara threw my hand away. I looked at him once more. There was a fury in his eyes, one I knew well. But it was different now, more focused; distilled by pain into something animalistic. "This is all your fault," he said. "All you ever do is cause me pain, trying to make yourself feel better, telling me that you're doing it for me. You keep making the same mistakes over and over and then tell me you'll try harder next time, but you can't even do the right now." He looked away from me. "You're a horrible brother."

My mouth hung open at Chara's words. My hands shook, and Chara's eyes went wide, as if he had just realized what he had said. "Asriel, I didn't mean that. I-"

I didn't hear the rest of it as I ran out of the room.

 

I went to the only place I could think to go. I sat atop the high towers of the castle, the entire city laid out beneath me, but for all I cared it didn't exist. I had the video camera my mom had found in our old home what felt like a lifetime ago in my hands. I couldn't tell you what possessed me to grab it. Perhaps I had simply thought I could escape to the past. At that point, it was all I had left. I picked a video at random and started watching.

The small screen on the side of the camera showed Chara's back. He was upside down, along with the rest of the world. Trees sprouted out of the top of the screen and my brother seemed to be staring at them. "Hey Chara?" I heard myself ask. "What'cha thinking about?"

My brother turned and rolled his eyes as he looked at the camera. "Why are you upside down?" He asked.

"Because, why not? Anyway, I asked first."

Chara giggled for a moment and looked back up at the trees. I followed with the camera for a moment, revealing the castle walls above the trees. A few monsters flew into the frame for a moment in the distance before drifting back out again. "I was thinking that this day was actually pretty good." He said finally.

"Oh really?" I asked as I brought the camera back to him. "Why's that?"

Chara looked into the lens. A smile split his face, a smile I had almost forgotten. It brought tears to my eyes to see it, not that they ever really stopped. "Because I got to spend it with you." He said just before the video ended.

I sat there staring at the last frame for a long time. My brother's smiling face showing a happiness that I now knew to be a lie. My thumb hovered over the delete key as I took in that look. _All of these memories are lies_ , I thought.

"Asriel?" My mom's voice came from below. I looked down to see her standing on the wall below the tower. "What are you doing up there?" She looked like she had been crying all night as well. "Chara has been asking for you this whole time."

I looked away. "He doesn't want to see me," I told her. "Not really…"

"Asriel…" My eyes met hers again, and she didn't need to say it for me to know.

It was time.

 

As I stood over Chara once more, it felt like my entire body had been hollowed out. Nothing filled it now, not even sorrow or guilt; I couldn't even summon those emotions. His eyes were closed now, and he no longer thrashed. His breaths came in shallow rasps that could barely be heard over the sobs of my parents and my own. My mom and dad stood behind me. Dad had a hand on my shoulder, gripping me tightly. His other hand rested on Chara's forehead. Mom held onto me like I may slip away at any moment as well.

Chara's eyes suddenly fluttered open. They seemed glazed over, but slowly they found their way to me. "Asriel," he said. It was so soft it almost seemed like he had only mouthed the words and the sound was merely a product of my imagination. Then he smiled. My hands, still on the camera, gripped it so tightly I thought it might break. I didn't understand. How could he be smiling at a time like this? "I'm sorry, Asriel." He spoke slowly, some of the words slurring into others. "I didn't mean what I said."

"I know," I found myself saying. And a part of me did know. Chara had simply been in pain; of course he would lash out. And yet… "I don't blame you." I went on. "You should be resting."

That smile stayed on my brother's face as his eyes closed again. "It's okay now. It doesn't hurt anymore."

My parents tensed. Dad's hand shook as he pulled it away from Chara's head in disbelief. "Chara?" Mom said. My brother didn't answer. He looked like he was sleeping. "Chara… Can you hear me? We want you to wake up…" He didn't stir.

"Chara!" My dad tried. His voice shook as he spoke more than mom's did. "You have to stay determined! You can't give up… You are the future of humans and monsters…"

I wanted to tell them. I hated seeing them like that. The despair, the pain; they didn't deserve that. They deserved to know what we did, what we intended to do, so that they could rest easy knowing Chara would not really be gone. I opened my mouth to tell them.

"Asriel," My brother said suddenly, stopping me short. "Do you think we can go back to that place one more time? The one with all those big golden flowers?"

"Of course," I told him. I wasn't sure what he meant by that. But, what else could I say?

Chara fell silent after that. My parents and I stood over him of a long time. We couldn't hear his breathing anymore. Finally, my father said, "I'll begin to make the arrangements." He stood to leave. My mom practically leapt into his arms and began to break down. Dad led her out of the room. And the door closed softly behind them.

That moment is forever locked in my mind. I have lived many moments in countless ways, and now as I look back on much of my life most of it almost feels… fleeting, like any of those moments could have changed as easily as a leave blows in the breeze. But that moment, that moment has a solidity to it like no other. I often find myself wondering why. An answer comes simply, but not one that is easy to accept. I have found that many effects can have several causes. Some things never seem to change no matter what you do differently. Would this have simply been the outcome no matter what I did?

I'm starting to think so…

I stood over the bed for I don't know how long. My knees felt weak, every fiber of my being told me that we made a mistake. Finally I threw the camera on the foot of the bed and myself along with it. Tears streamed down my face, I wished I could make them stop, but I couldn't. "Chara, please… wake up…" I whispered to him. His eyes were still closed. Somehow Chara looked peaceful. I guess, in a way, he finally got what he wanted. But I felt so alone in that moment that I almost hated he could look so happy. "I don't like this plan anymore…" My voice broke as I finally said what had been floating in my mind all day. My eyes were blurry. I wanted nothing more than to wake up from that nightmare. "I… I…" I struggled to speak, to even think.

I realized something had grabbed my hand. It was Chara. He looked up at me still smiling. He looked so weak; I wasn't sure how he managed even that. But that smile renewed my confidence. I tried to steel in my mind the thought that this was not an end, but merely a beginning. I wiped my eyes and took his hand in mine. "No," I said, standing back up. "I said… I said I'd never doubt you. Six, right? We just have to get six… And we'll do it together, right?" Chara nodded his head ever so slightly. His eyes fluttered closed and somehow I knew that was it.

Chara was gone.

For a moment, nothing happened. I stood alone in my room wondering if we had somehow been wrong. My fear began to build. Were the legends not true? Then, the blankets wrapped around Chara's body began to glow. I pulled them away and the light grew. The red light of Chara's soul, heart shaped even now, hovered above their still form. It hung motionless as I stared at it. I put my hand out to it and it seemed to be drawn towards me. I held it out over my hand as I pulled it away from my brother and I started to cry again. "Come on, Chara," I said to the tiny light, "let's go home."


	10. The Last Adventure

I had never seen the barrier before that day. I'd never even gone near it. If I were being honest with you, the very idea of it scared me to death, as it did many monsters. It was likely only because my parents regarded it with such indifference that I was able to be comfortable with living so close to it in the first place. But, there was a big difference between having several walls of stone between you and it and actually being near it, so I kept my distance, and hoped that all of those rumors about it causing weird stuff to happen weren't actually true.

I remember I would often catch Chara glancing in its direction, regardless of where we were in the castle or the city, as if he always knew exactly where it was. In the beginning, he would just glance at it, and then turn away as if blinded by some immense light. Near the end, though, he would sometimes stare at it for minutes, looking like he was trying to puzzle something out. I guess I have a pretty good idea what that was now. I don't think Chara ever actually went near it either.

It wasn't what I expected it to be. I imagined in my head some massive wall, an ornately carved obsidian gate, or a thing of nightmares guarded by some fairytale demon. My parents were never very forthcoming with any details either. I only ever asked my dad what it looked like once. He said, "It is the embodiment of despair: a fleeting hope, always out of reach." I never understood what he meant by that until I finally saw it for myself and found there was really no better way to describe it.

The barrier looked nothing like its name. It was a corridor, one that seemed to extend on forever. The ceiling rose high above my head, lending to the effect of its immensity. The walls slowly pulsed with light down their length until it disappeared into the infinite, converging on a point directly in its center. As I stared at it, there were times I was almost convinced it was flat, and yet I knew that if I tried to walk down it, I would never reach that end.

It is truly horrible, when you think about it. Logic would lead one to believe that there _must_ be a limit to it and at that limit would be the surface. But it doesn't end; I know that for sure, now. And once you get lost in that, there's only one way out.

As I stared down its length for the first time, I felt cold. The warmth from Chara's soul floating above my hand was all that kept me from shaking. I tore my eyes away from the barrier and looked at the heart-shaped light. _This is it_ , I thought. All I had to do was take in Chara's soul, make it a part of my own, and we could start.

I wasn't really sure what to do. We had never really thought about it. I hesitated, and in that moment I heard someone call my name. "Asriel?"

I turned to see my mother standing inside the doorway constructed to mask and seal off the barrier, if need be. She still looked exhausted, and more than worried. I wasn't able to comprehend at the time that it had only been a short period since I had seen her last. It already felt like it had been an eternity… "I was coming to check you, but you were gone." She said. "What are you…?" She went silent as she saw what I held. Her gaze fixated on it, and she started to look like she had just woken up from a nightmare, or into one. "What are you doing?" she finished.

She knew, and wanted to say more too, I could tell. She wanted to scream at me for being so thoughtless, to demand that I come back to her, but her fear kept it to that simple question: a denial of the reality she could clearly see with her own eyes. Was that what I looked like, as I watched Chara slowly die?

There was more questions as well, wrapped within that one. Who put this idea in my head? When? The answers to those should have been simple enough.

Strangely, I smiled. "It was Chara's last wish," I found myself saying, looking down at the soft light in my hand. Why was I hiding behind those words? "To see the flowers he liked one last time." In a way, it was true. He did say he wanted to see them again, and we would. But there were other things that needed to be taken care of first. I looked up at my mother with what I hoped was determination. "I'm going to make that wish come true." I told her. "And then…" Tears came to my eyes; my voice cracked. They were impossible to hold back. "I'm going to set us all free. So we can all live on the surface together." They deserved to know the truth, that this was what we'd planned all along, even if I told them in some roundabout way. Everything was already in motion, so what did it matter if they found out? But for whatever reason I couldn't make myself just say it.

My mom took a step closer, her arm out as if to pull me back, but she stopped short, glancing at the barrier to my back. "Asriel," she said, voice soft. "I understand you wish to make Chara happy, and that you are upset and angry, but there is no need for this. We will find another way to open the barrier. We have not given up hope yet."

I shook my head. "No," I told her. "This is the only way." I had finally convinced myself that my brother's words were true. This _was_ the only way. And no one would turn me away from it now. My mother opened her mouth to argue more, but I wouldn't let her. I pushed Chara's soul to my chest, felt the light become absorbed by my body, and the world caught fire. I felt my body burned to ash, felt my soul be swept up in a raging inferno, and my vision went white.

The first thing I felt after that was my feet touch the ground. My vision faded from white to black and I opened my eyes. My mom was still standing just as she had been before, shock and horror now mixed with the confusion on her face. I noticed something off about the way I saw her. She seemed… shorter. The ground seemed further away as well.

I raised my hands to look at them, but they were not my own. They were larger, older. I felt my face and my body. _I_ was older. I looked down at myself. I was no longer in the body of a twelve year old kid, weak and frail. This body was strong. Muscles defined themselves beneath my short white fur. Cracks ran down my arms and halfway down my legs. They pulsed softly with a red light that traced their path back to the center of my chest. There, the red light shone strong, right where Chara's soul would have rested on his own body. As I looked at it, white light swirled with the red, and I felt myself start to laugh.

It worked.

"It worked!" I said out loud, throwing my arms out. My voice sounded strange, too deep. My mother jumped back. I wasn't sure if it was because of my voice or my movements. I hardly cared; I was ecstatic that our plan had actually succeeded. There had always been a seed of doubt in my mind, but now it was squashed. I felt so… powerful. There was no question in my mind that I could what needed to be done.

I ran over to hug her, to share the joy I felt with her, but she shrunk back from my grip once again. I stopped halfway between her and the barrier. She looked terrified. I didn't understand why. "Mom," I said in my strange new voice. "What's wrong?" Why was she not happy? Her son just gained the power that would lead monsters to salvation! How could my mother not be overjoyed as well with what I had done? It'd worked!

"What have you done?" She whispered, though it took me a moment to realize she had. Her voice sounded as loud to me as if she had spoken normally right in my ear. I realized I could hear her breathing as well, shallow and quick; she was panicking.

Slowly, I lowered my arms. "What do you mean?" I asked. "I did what I had to. This way, Chara doesn't have to die. This was what he wanted. This was the only way he thought he could help."

My mother squeezed her eyes shut. "Oh, Asriel." Was that… pity in her voice?

I turned towards the door as I heard steps in the room beyond and cut off my next words as they approached. My mother turned as well, looking fearful, as if she might be attacked. A few moments later, my father stood in the doorway. "Tori?" he said as he saw her. "What are you doing up here. Did you feel that earthquake? It felt like it shook the whole castle. I-" He cut himself off as his eyes locked on me. Shock turned into cold fury in almost an instant, and before I knew what was happening, he charged at me, weapon in hand. I held my own hand up in reaction, for a split second fearing that my own father would cut me down, but he stopped short. His strike hit some sort of invisible wall. My mom screamed as the magically wrought metal rung against the unseen force. "Who are you?" he demanded. Then, his eyes widened. "Release me!"

I wasn't sure what he was talking about. Where had that wall come from? Rage still burned in my father's eyes. Why was he not attacking again? Then I felt the spell that wove its way from me and all around my father, locking him in place. Had I formed the wall then as well? How had I done that without thinking?

"Whatever madness brought you here on this of all days, you will explain yourself to me." My father went on as if I were the one bound and not him.

"Dad? What are you talking about?" I spluttered. "I… It's me, Asriel." I let go of the spell holding him and he seemed to drop as if that were the only thing that held him up.

"Asriel?" he whispered in disbelief. Had he really not recognized me? Did I really look so different? I wished that I could see for myself. And with that thought, a mirror popped out of thin air between my father and me. It was little more than a simple rectangle that showed a monster I had never seen before, and it took even me a moment to realize that was what I now looked like. It was not only my body that had grown older, but my face as well. It looked sharper, harder. The cracks of light from my soul ran up my neck and almost up to my eyes. They looked like they had gotten darker; no longer red, but a deep crimson not far from black. The light in my chest still glowed just the same. My eyes were now pools as dark as pitch with white disks that seemed to shine even in the presence of the barrier whose unearthly light seemed to come from all points at once. Horns almost as long as my father's grew out of my head that curved back over my ears.

I raised my hand to touch the reflection. I was naked, I realized. I decided to try something. I pictured the robes in my mind and they appeared on me a moment later. The delta rune now concealed the light of my soul. I looked at myself and smiled. A high collar rose almost over my head as part of a cloak that fell over my shoulders. It all felt… right.

I let the mirror fall away and let my father take in the changes in me once more. "What have you done?" he asked, just like mom had.

I looked down at him incredulously. "Can't you see?" I asked. Their words could not take the pride from my voice.

"You took Chara's soul." He answered simply.

"Yes, and with it our millennium of imprisonment will be over!" I tried to sound excited, but there was an edge of anger to my voice. Why did they refuse to see this as a good thing?

"Why?" my father asked.

"This is what he asked me to do." I told him.

"Asriel…" My father stood. He and I were almost at eye level now, but I was still shorter. "You need to stop this," he said. "I know you are in pain. I know you grieve, but this is not right."

He placed a hand on my shoulder. I hit it away. "Not right?" I questioned. "This is the only thing that has felt right in a long time!"

"I know that you may think that, but listen to me. In time you will see that-"

"No," I said, cutting him off. I was done entertaining this. There was work that needed to be done. "I see now that nothing I say will convince you." I said as I turned to the barrier. It seemed to stretch only to the future now. "Perhaps when I am done you will be willing to see." I took one step before something grabbed my arm. I looked down to see it was my mother. She said nothing. I had never seen her look so desperate. That time, it was I who felt pity. "Chara wanted me to tell you that he loves you," I said, "and that he's sorry. Sorry he wasn't able to be strong enough." My mom let go of my arm, and I stepped up to the barrier. "But now, I will be."

Remembering what I had been taught about the nature of the barrier, I reached out to it with a simple spell and felt it pull at me. It latched on to the energy I touched it with and tried to snake its way back to me, eating at the magic to help fuel it. I severed the spell and immediately understood what I had to do. I wove a shield around myself, trying to remember what I had done to stop my father's attack. I felt power surge within me. There was so much it was almost sickening. I fed as much of that power into the shield as I could and approached the barrier. It seemed to bend around it. I smiled.

"Asriel…" My mother called, making me look back.

I said nothing. I knew that if I stayed any longer that they would just try to stop me. I had to leave now. _I should bring Chara with me_ I thought at the last second, and just like that Chara's body was suddenly in my arms. He was wrapped in the blanket that had covered him in his last moments. I truly could do anything.

I stepped forward without looking back again. The barrier rippled as I approached and then seemed to give way. I could feel it eating away at my shield; it would not last forever, but with my strength it would last long enough. Reality itself seemed to bend and stretch around me. It parted in a void before me and then snapped back to a singular point. That point seemed to explode as I felt my shield finally become ripped away, and then there was only darkness. I collapsed to my knees, and for a moment I thought that I had failed. But then I could feel the dirt beneath me, hear my labored breathing echo off of the walls of some unseen cave.

I let my strength rebuild for a moment and then summoned a light to reveal my surroundings. It was indeed a cave. Browned, fallen leaves covered the ground and the walls of stone sloped up to form a low ceiling. It was very mundane. Somehow, I had expected something more significant to be on the other side of the barrier. I looked back where I had crossed. It was solid stone; the back of the cave. Reached out to it with magic again and felt a similar pull to what I had felt before. It was still there then, just hidden seamlessly with the rock around it.

I began to follow the cave away from the barrier. There were a number of twists and turns before I reached anything. The first thing of any significance I found was an arch. It was incredibly weathered, to the point where I almost didn't catch it at first. It reminded me of the architecture in Home. I found myself trying to think of what this cave could have looked like when this arch was first made. And then I saw it. In the center of the top of the arch, worn almost to obscurity, was the Delta Rune. But that was impossible. The Delta Rune had not become our symbol until we had already been trapped for centuries. How could it be sitting _outside_ the barrier?

Light washed its way in beyond the arch and I began to feel a force pushing me onward. I listened to it, eager to be on my way now that I had finally begun. The light grew as I pressed on, enough that I took away my own light as the mouth of the cave came into view. I emerged in a forest. Tall trees surrounded me that were covered in the first budding leaves of spring. It was still dark, and yet the night seemed brighter than any I could remember underground. Light still seemed to filter down between the branches, but it was paler than that which came from the sun. There was a chill to the air, not as cold as it was in Snowdin, but definitely cooler than the rest of the Underground.

As I scanned my surroundings, half in awe and half in search of a path onwards, the air began to stir around me. Slowly at first, but quickly becoming a torrent around me. I held Chara's body close to me and readied a spell to ward off whatever trap I had just triggered.

" _It's okay,_ " something said to me. It was not really a voice, more so similar to the feeling I had in the cave. It seemed to suggest words rather than say them. " _It's just the wind._ "

Some part of me immediately knew it was Chara, and a fear I had not even acknowledged yet melted away. I let go of the spell and straightened. A smile came to my face. "I thought I had lost you." I said aloud.

There was a pause. " _Me too…_ " Chara's words came to me with a mixture of emotions, fear, relief, and no small amount of joy. His emotions mirrored many of my own. For a moment I simply reveled in that. For the first time I could truly know and understand my brother's feelings. Something I had longed for, for quite some time.

I could still feel his urgency to move on as well, and I understood his impatience. We had waited a long time for this moment, and he had gone through much. I could also feel annoyance. He knew what I was doing and was not amused. I made sure he knew I didn't care. "Where do we go?" I asked, still out loud, though I didn't really need to.

" _Keep going,_ " he said.

My gaze fell between the trees to the place Chara wanted me to go. I started to walk. The night was eerily still, especially to my heightened hearing. The only sound the world seemed to make was the snapping of sticks and the crumpling of leaves beneath my feet. The wind continued to pick up every so often and I tried to ignore it. Why did the air move on its own? It was more than a little unsettling. I instead tried to focus on the smells it carried with it. So many of them were foreign to me that I couldn't give an accurate comparison. I was able to pick out the scents of the trees, familiar and welcome though the trees themselves were none that I recognized. I could smell pine in the air, somewhere distant though. There was the smell of the dirt and stone of the mountain, the smell of water from a stream nearby. All of that was beneath a menagerie of the unidentifiable – sweet and bitter and sharp and subtle and cloying. They hinted at mysteries even greater than the moving air, hidden beyond the trees, and I was eager to discover it all.

My imaginings did not prepare me for the reality, however. As the forest began to thin, I could first see the sky, and I found myself drawn to it. Stars glittered high above, though there were far less than what was shown above New Home. I was disappointed by that. I thought there would be so many more in the real thing. Then I saw it: a light far brighter than any other. It hung in the sky as if it were watching down on the world. Its pocked surface was a mixture of white and gray and it shrouded all of the stars around it.

It was the moon. Chara had described the sun's nocturnal counterpart to me, but seeing it was another thing entirely.

You know, it amazes me what humans take for granted. When Chara told me about the moon, he told me that it had a name: Luna. I thought it silly. Why give it a name when there was only one? He told me that they named the sun as well, and I thought that even sillier. It's because we named all of the other stars in the sky, he explained, we thought our own deserved a name as well. And that raised even more questions. The sun was a star? Yes, he said, just much closer. I supposed I could accept that, but that still didn't explain why they named the moon. There was still just one of those. For our planet, he said, but there are more around the others. We named those as well. My jaw dropped. There were other planets? He nodded, loving my reaction to all of this. I claimed that he must be lying; my mind had already been filled with images of how immense the surface was that there was no way I would believe there could be so much more beyond that as well. But as I stared up at the moon that night, a perfect sphere hanging in the sky, I believed it. I thought back on what my brother told me, and it made me even more eager for the future.

I reached the foot of a small rise. Stones formed steps up to the top of it. They looked like they had been placed there on purpose. I quickly made my way to the top and was met with a view more spectacular than any I had ever conjured in my head.

Mt. Ebbot dropped away beneath my feet beyond the cliff, and I got my first real look at the surface. It was truly immense, just as my brother had described, but his words did not do it justice. The ground _literally_ looked to stretch out forever. Directly below me was more forest, but farther away the trees became fields. The grasses of the fields were all different shades, sectioned off like some giant puzzle where the pieces got smaller and smaller as they got further away. In the distance, there were more mountains. They snaked across the land. None were as high as where I stood, but I still knew they were immense. There was a lake in the distance. Its mirror surface reflected the moon, making it look like a hole in the Earth itself, giving the illusion that it was almost paper-thin. I tried to picture how much bigger what I could see was than the Underground, how many times over it would fit into this space, but I couldn't. And this was only a small fraction of what there really was.

Spots of light moved through the night along lines that seemed cut into the land. Hundreds of the lights passed by one another. They seemed to be moving incredibly fast. I followed them with my eye. They seemed to get denser and denser as they moved off in one direction, and as I continued to follow I saw the reason why. The lights began to rise into the sky at a certain point on the ground. I had to rely on Chara's thoughts to identify what it was, and even then I didn't completely believe it. It was a city, a human city. Like everything else on the surface, it was immense. Buildings rose to impossible heights, lights of a million colors danced from it in my vision. I felt like I could almost hear the noise of it from where I stood, the clamor of some many people packed in together like that. And we thought New Home was crowded. Why would they all sequester into that small area if they had so much space? I realized Chara didn't know either.

I felt Chara's emotions swirling with my own again as I looked out over the surface a measure of somberness mixing with my own awe. "It's beautiful." I whispered.

" _It is._ " Chara said.

"I can't believe this."

" _I know._ " It almost felt like my brother was laughing in my head. " _It's weird… You're like and open book Asriel. I can see your whole life. Every memory you keep and every feeling that you have with them._ "

I found myself laughing as well. "Really?" I asked. "I wouldn't say I feel that different. I mean, I feel you, but not like that."

Unease stirred within the bundle of emotions that I now knew to be my brother in the back of my mind. " _I'm sorry,_ " he said.

I felt like I shouldn't question what he meant by that, despite the fact that it was first thing he said that I didn't immediately understand the meaning behind. "Is this what you wanted me to see?" I asked instead.

There was another pause. " _No,_ " he said.

"Where should we go then?"

" _There._ "

I looked up at the city again. Excitement surged within me, likely my own. I had hoped I would be able to get a closer look at that. I began to walk back from the cliff to find my way down the mountain, but I stopped. " _We should really get going,_ " Chara said. " _It'll take a while to walk all the way there._ "

"I don't think we'll have to walk." I said, smirking as I looked back at the city again.

Chara was quick to catch what I had in mind. " _Are you sure that will work?_ "

"Positive." I focused on one of the buildings, the tallest in the city by far, and tried to imagine myself standing on top of it. I blinked, and felt the world around me shift. When my eyes opened I was no longer surrounded by the view of the surface, but by four waist-high walls with the glow of lights far below highlighting their edge. I was on the roof. There truly was no end to what this power could do.

Sound assaulted my ears, roars in a hundred different pitches and loud wails mingled with the sounds of unknown music and the voices of conversation. I relied on Chara's memories to stop it all from overwhelming me. The roars were from cars, the things with lights flying across the ground I saw before. The wails were from police and ambulances, people trying to help people who were hurt or in trouble. I walked over to the wall and looked out beyond it. Even that this early hour, hundreds of humans milled about in the streets. There were still lights on in almost every building – I still couldn't get over how tall they all were! Some of the lights were even part of the buildings themselves. They each had pictures and drawings that moved or changed as you looked at them. "This is amazing!" I shouted over the noise and the wind. "I can't believe humans built all of this." Chara's somber mood mixed with mine as I continued to look down at the street. I turned away from it, smiling, trying to send some of my joy back to him. "Though, I guess I really shouldn't be surprised, huh? What with how much stronger humans are than monsters."

For a moment my brother's emotions became unreadable. I had just enough time to question how he had done that before the moment had passed. " _Would you believe me if I said we did it all without magic?_ " he asked.

"What?" I almost laughed. "No way." Surely, that was impossible. Then I realized Chara was being serious. His emotions darkened.

" _This is what I wanted to show you._ " he said. " _Look closer._ "

I did look closer. Turning back to the street, I focused on the people far below. Even at this distance, I could practically make them out as if I were standing right next to them. I tried to see what my brother was trying to get me to see. "I don't get it," I said after a minute. "They just look like humans."

" _What's missing?_ " he asked.

Missing? I looked again. To me, they all practically looked the same. They all had two arms, two legs, two eyes, a nose, a mouth, hair on top of their head at various lengths. They all looked almost exactly like Chara to me, except…

I scanned the crowd below once more to check if I was imagining it. I felt my own panic begin to swell within me. No, it wasn't possible. I have to be wrong, because if I'm right then they…

" _They have no souls._ " Chara's words echoed my own thoughts and I felt as if the building I was standing on had given way beneath me.

"How can that be?" I breathed.

" _I don't know._ " Chara admitted. " _I just know that I never had that light in my chest before I came to the Underground. I couldn't use magic either. No one could._ "

That made no sense. Magic was everywhere, all the time. It saturated the air, it was impossible _not_ to use. How could humans not even have any instances of using it on accident? Especially with how strong they were. And it _was_ there. I could feel it, I…

No, I was wrong. I reached out the way I normally would have before preparing a spell, but there was nothing there. I had mistaken the power within myself as just the flow of energy around me, but there was truly _nothing_. Suddenly the air felt dull, stale. I didn't want to be there anymore. Or perhaps that was just my panic at the revelation.

What were we going to do? If humans had no souls, no ability to use magic, how could we destroy the barrier? Were we truly doomed to be trapped forever?

"No," I denied. "Maybe it's different somewhere else. The world is huge, right? Maybe it makes sense for there to be parts of it where magic are weaker and stronger. Like the way the air moves."

" _It's the same everywhere._ " I hated how sure my brother sounded.

"You don't know that." I said. "You haven't seen the whole world."

" _Maybe, but it's the same._ "

I practically threw my denial at Chara. Perhaps he was ready to give up, but I wasn't.

We left the city behind. I jumped back to the mountains, and then I jumped to the next set of mountains, then to the next, until I found another city. I looked through it as I had the first, but it was the same. I realized I needed to go farther.

All around the world I jumped. The sun and moon danced in the sky as I searched for our salvation, hopping back and forth to anywhere humanity gathered. I didn't even spare more than a glance for the places I passed. Vast deserts, massive bodies of water, endless plains and canyons, mountains that billowed smoke or were capped with snow despite the heat around them; all of it was meaningless in my search. But everywhere it was the same. Everyplace I stopped, I reached out hoping to find some semblance of magic, but there was always nothing.

Finally, with nowhere left to look, I returned to Mt. Ebbot empty handed. The sun now hung high in the sky over the mountain. Thin clouds crawled across a canvas of blue that at that moment looked little different than the cavern I knew lay beneath my feet.

We had failed. Everything we had done was for nothing. I looked down at my brother's body, still clutched to my own, and I felt another wave of guilt crash down on me. Chara had given up his life, his soul, and we had failed.

A thought came to me. _Chara's soul…_ "That's it," I said out loud. "You had a soul in the Underground. You could use magic. All we need to do is convince a few humans to come back with us. We can still do this!" I felt a smile split my face as my hope was restored. Of course, I thought. It was so simple I hadn't thought of it before.

" _That won't work._ " Chara responded.

My smile slipped. "What are you talking about?" I asked him.

" _That's doesn't fix the real problem,_ " he said.

"What real problem?"

He didn't answer right away. Once more, my brother's emotions seemed to disappear for a moment. I could still feel him there, but it was like a numb spot at the back of my thoughts. " _There's something else you need to see._ "

I found myself turned back to the city in the valley below once more. It seemed to stand out even more in the sun. Its muted colors made it almost look like a blister in the middle of the forest.

Now where did that thought come from?

I found myself standing on that building again. With the passage of the night, the city seemed… dirtier, like a blanket being pulled back to reveal stained sheets beneath. Even more people milled about in the streets now. The cars were packed in tighter that I would have thought possible as well. They fought for dominance with one another and with the people on foot as their paths crossed that of the machines'. I could feel a sickening smell begin to gather at the back of my throat as I watched and I fought the urge to cough. Beyond that, though, there was nothing new.

"What else is there to see?" I asked my brother.

" _Look closer,_ " he told me. " _There._ "

My head turned toward one of the vehicles sitting before a narrow alley. Lights flashed rapidly all over it. As I watched, two humans got out. Both of them wore the same outfit and had an air of caution to their movements. They walked towards a group further down the alley that I realized was beating another human. The human in the center of the group was doubled over while trying to struggle in vain to pull his arms free from his captors' grips. I wanted to help them, but Chara held me back. _Watch_ , his thoughts seemed to whisper to me. And so I did, though I winced every time a blow landed.

The two humans in matching outfits walked up to the group almost casually. One of them said something; I could see their lips move but couldn't make out what they said over the wind and the other sounds of the city vying for my constant attention. The group beating the one human stopped. They looked at the two others and one of them split away, walking up to the two. They exchanged words, and something passed hands from the lone human to the pair. The pair nodded to each other and turned to walk back to their car. The group resumed beating their victim.

"What?" I breathed, leaning over the half-wall as if the shorter distance would reveal what I saw to be the lie I hoped it to be.

I watched the car with the flashing lights drive away before my brother spoke up, " _They're supposed to protect people. It's their job. And yet…_ "

"That's horrible…" I said, still staring after the car. I went back to the others. I felt sickened looking at what I saw and decided enough was enough. A quick spell blew the attackers back and off their feet.

" _What are you doing?_ " Chara actually sounded angry at me for helping.

"What those two failed to do." I told him.

The attacks slowly got back to their feet. They exchanged words, glancing fearfully between their victim and each other. Then the man who had gone to talk to the two in uniform, their leader if I had to guess, yelled at them and they approached the doubled over human once more. I blew them back again, and that time they did the smart thing and ran off. I pushed my brother's annoyance from my own thoughts.

" _Doing that doesn't change anything._ " Chara told me.

"How can you say that?" My own chagrin was beginning to leach into my voice. I saw the human that had been attacked collapse before my brother could answer. I was in the street in an instant. I knelt down, placing Chara's body next to me and hovering my hands over beaten human's fallen form. I was never all that inclined to healing magic, but I was beginning to have little doubt in my power's capabilities. A golden light surrounded my hands. I felt connected to the man below me in some way; I could feel what was wrong with him and mend it.

" _There's no point to this._ " My brother commented.

"Chara, we'll talk about this later." I said, trying to concentrate. Power or not, healing without simply causing further harm is difficult, and having a voice in my head constantly questioning my actions was proving to be rather distracting at that moment.

" _He's no different than them._ " Chara went on, ignoring me. An image of the other group of humans flashed in my mind with the words.

"From what I could see, he was the one getting beat up, not the rest of them." I argued.

" _He's still the same._ "

The man beneath me started to cough before I could say anything more. I ended my spell and jumped back into the shadows, watching as the human struggled back to their feet. I had managed to heal the worst of their wounds – there really was so much more to humans than monsters – but there was still quite a bit I hadn't gotten to yet. The man looked to be in pain, but he stood regardless.

"If he were smart, he'd find a doctor." I whispered to myself as the man looked around, apparently shocked to find that he was still alive and alone in the alley.

" _He won't._ " Chara said.

"What makes you keep saying that?" I demanded. Before Chara could answer, I heard the man whisper something to himself, and then he began to move toward the mouth of the street.

"… _You started this._ " Chara said as the man reached the mouth of the alley. " _Fine. Watch. You'll see that I'm right._ "

The man turned out into the street and then I rose to follow. I jumped back to the top of the building and scanned the crowd until I found him again. It wasn't hard. The man had a visible limp and other people parted around him like he was diseased. He continued down the street and I jumped to another building, much smaller than the other, but still high enough to watch the man.

He seemed desperate to keep moving. I thought perhaps it was because he was worried his attackers would come back. The man kept one hand in the pocket of his coat and kept glancing over his shoulder. He continued on until he made it to a small building with a square pavilion in front of it. I watched cars pull under this pavilion and come back out again as the man disappeared beneath it. "Is that a doctor?" I asked.

" _No._ "

I could no longer see the man as he entered the building. I looked around and found another alley I would be able to see the entrance from. I jumped down. The front of the building was almost entirely made of glass. Colorful pictures covered much of the front wall, but these did not move. I could still see inside behind them. The man was talking to another behind the counter. No, they were arguing, I realized. There were others in the building as well. For some reason, they kept their distance and watched the man, wide-eyed with… was that fear?

The argument suddenly became more heated. The man's arm shot up. I heard a loud bang, and the man behind the counter collapsed to the ground. A second later, one of the other people inside swung at the back of the man's head and he collapsed as well with another loud bang. The person who had knocked the man out picked something up from him and placed it on the counter before backing away. The people gathered around outside were all staring at the scene now as well. They almost looked as confused as I felt. "What happened?" I asked.

" _He killed the man behind the counter._ " Chara said. There was no readable emotion behind the words.

Another wave of shock crashed over me. "What? Why?"

" _He was trying to rob the store._ " Chara said. " _I told you, he was no better than the others._ "

I continued to stare at the scene before me. One of the people inside was talking into a rectangle they held near their head. Many of them looked to be crying. The man who had knocked the other man out sat against the wall with his back to me. His shoulders shook as well. None of it made sense to me. My shock quickly turned to anger at my own confusion. It just didn't make sense!

"No," I said, denying the truth before me once again. There had to be some reason behind it. No one acted so irrationally. I looked to the man collapsed on the ground. I wished I could know why, peer into their life and see what led them to this. I _needed_ to know. And then, I found that I could. Images flashed before my mind that I knew not to be from Chara, but from the man as he had seen them. What I saw was a hard life; a struggle against starvation, sickness, and a fear of those who contend for a corrupted power around him. It was also a life filled with hate, hate for those better off than him simply because they were born in a different time and a different place, and hatred for the struggle that was thrust upon him at birth, robbing him of what he felt was a true life as a human.

I felt tears stream down my face as I watched this man's life like it were one of the movies on the small camera screen back home. I saw his last moments. I felt his pain as he was beaten in the alley and I knew why he was beaten. They wanted money; a debt that had been unpaid. An unfair debt, one he was forced to accept or risk death. I had been right, when he awoke, he feared the other's return and sought to get them what they wanted before anything worse could come. I saw that he'd be willing to get it by any means necessary.

By some means, I cut off the connection between me and the man. I squeezed my eyes shut as I pushed away the remaining images. "His hand was forced." I told Chara. "He had no choice but this life."

" _No, he had a choice,_ " Chara said. " _And this was what he made._ "

I shook my head. "What else could he have done, thrust into a world like that? This system I saw… That's what's broken. That can be fixed."

" _Do you really think someone that was better off would be different?_ " Chara argued.

"Of course," I told him without hesitation.

I could feel his disappointment build. Images began to flash in my mind, a thousand different atrocities that I could not even name. Most felt like they were from a movie, I could feel a physical barrier between me and what I saw. Others I could tell they were happening in front of me. Worse still were the ones that felt like they were happening _to_ me. I immediately knew these to be Chara's memories, what he had seen; what he had experienced. They all came out in a sudden flood, overwhelming me. I was unable to process it all so quick, but I saw enough to leave me shaken.

" _Humans are selfish above all,_ " he said as the images faded. " _Look at any of them and you will see. Even those who do selfless things are always for selfish reasons; either to ease guilt, to get to heaven, or to gain something else. It is never for the people they help. They only help themselves._ " He paused, and sorrow seemed to consume him, or maybe that was my own for I found myself believing my brother. As I looked over the crowds again, I could see it, like flashes of light before my eyes, impressions of their thoughts. They all, each and every one of them, reflected my brother's words. " _There's no way we, nor anyone, could hope to change that._ "

"That doesn't mean we can't make peace." I argued. "Then, maybe once they see how monsters live, they'll start to change."

" _There will never be peace._ " Chara stated. " _Humans fear change; they fear the unknown. They would rather destroy something if it holds even the slightest chance of changing their world. If monsters came to this, they would be wiped out before we could even say hello. And even if they weren't, our way of life would not inspire them to change. It would only drive them to hate us. Then they would destroy us simply because we have what they do not._ "

I felt my anger begin to bubble up inside me. "Then what do we do?" I shouted. "Why even come here at all if you knew all of this already? If you were so sure that it wouldn't work, then why…?" Then the answer came to me. "No, Chara…" I whispered.

" _It's the only way._ " He said sadly, but determinately as well.

I jumped back up to the top of the building. The mugginess of the alley was beginning to get to me, and I needed a clear head to think. "This is what you wanted from the beginning…" I breathed. "Chara, how could you keep this from me?"

" _Would you have agreed if I told you?_ "

"No, of course not, but that's no excuse!"

" _I had to do it._ " He told me. " _You needed to see the truth, and this was the only way to do it._ "

I clenched my teeth to stop myself from screaming. I felt so used, and it didn't help that I had my brother's thoughts in my head and knew that he was right. I would have never believed him if I had not seen it with my own eyes. It was hard to fix in my mind that that did not make it right, just as it did not make what he was trying to suggest right either.

With a thought, I jumped back to the mountain, once again looking out over the fields and the forest. " _What are you doing?_ " Chara asked.

"Proving you wrong," I said as I found what I was looking for. There was a small town outside of the city. What I had in mind would work better there. The forest's edge rimmed the town, and I felt the air rush around me before I was standing among the trees. In front of me was a field. Lines of white were painted over the grass in places forming a box on the ground. To my right there was a park, children played amongst many odd shaped structures while their parents looked on from benches further back. Behind the two, the ground sloped up to a hill. A single tree occupied the top of the rise, it was surrounded by a patch of flowers all different hues.

Two humans stood alone in the outlined field as they bounced a ball on their heads between them, smiling as they did so. They looked to be grown up, and I figured they would be a good place to start.

" _You're crazy if you think this will work._ " Chara said as he picked up on what I was doing.

"Unlike you, I'm not ready to give up yet." I snapped back at him.

" _You're only going to make things worse._ "

I kept my eyes on the humans in the field, trying to bite back my anger; that was no way to make a first impression. "And _you're_ not going to stop me." I told him as I stepped out from the trees.

The field was a short distance away from the park. I hoped that it was far enough away that we wouldn't suddenly be joined by more humans as it might complicate things. I walked slowly and casually up to the two humans that were playing together. One turned and saw me as I approached, his eyes glossing past me at first and then snapping back. The ball dropped to the ground as he failed to hit it back to his friend. His mouth hung half open. I smiled, trying my best to seem friendly. The other human turned to see what his friend was staring at, and instantly looked the more terrified of the two. Not the best start.

"Howdy," I said, making the pair jump slightly. I blamed it on my new voice; it was difficult to make it sound soft. "Sorry, I know I may be a bit… shocking but, if you're willing to listen, I can explain what I am and why I'm here. I was wondering if you'd be able to help-" I made the mistake of taking another step forward. The one human took a step back in response. His foot went down onto the ball and he slipped, falling to the ground. That seemed to snap them both out of their daze. The one still standing began to run back towards the park, the other scrambled to their feet and followed after.

I reached out as they ran away. "Wait!" I actually tried to call after them. My hand slowly lowered as I saw them run out of sight. A few of the people in the park looked after them as they passed and then turned towards me. I jumped away before they could see me, hiding back amongst the trees.

" _I told you it wouldn't work._ " There was no mockery to Chara's words, but I couldn't help but hear it anyway. " _Are you ready to start listening to me now?_ "

I shook my head. "There are billions of humans on the surface." I told him. "I'm sure we'll be able to find six who are willing to come with us."

" _And will you ask every single one of them until someone agrees?_ "

"If that's what it takes."

Bitter amusement flowed from Chara. " _I think it's already too late._ "

I looked back to the park. It was empty now. I jumped to the hill with the lone tree to try to see where they all could have gone so quickly. The hill gave a good view into the lower part of the town. Within, I saw a crowd. In their center, I could make out the two I had tried to talk to. They were speaking frantically to the others who all wore skeptical expressions. Then, one of them turned towards me and froze. His friend still went on until the one got his attention. He pointed up at me and the rest of the crowd's heads followed. I felt like I should jump away again, but I pushed it down. I let them see me, and waited at the top of the hill.

There were a few more minutes of talking; many eyes did not leave me during that discussion. Then, a portion of the group broke off and began their way towards me. The rest ran quickly into the buildings around them. I continued to wait as the group cautiously came closer, thinking, perhaps, that something could be made of this.

" _They're coming,_ " Chara said as if I couldn't see that.

"Let them come, maybe they'll feel more comfortable letting me explain if there are more of them."

" _This is a mistake._ "

"No!" I shouted at him. "Everything we've done up until now has been the mistake. This is the right thing to do." My brother seemed to pull back in response, his emotions vanishing from my mind. All for the better, I thought. I needed a clear head for this.

The crowd approached the hill, spreading out and surrounding me as they made their way up. Some of the humans were pointing things up at me, black holes drilled into their centers like a third eye, watching. Something in Chara's memories made me very afraid of them. I did nothing. I had already decided to let them do whatever they want to make themselves feel at ease. I doubted they could actually do anything to me if they tried. Though, there was much of my new power I had yet to test the limits of.

Finally, they stopped. One stood before me, closer than the rest and clearly in charge. The man stared up at me and I stared back. He was nearly a foot shorter than me and had an aged look to him. His face was wrinkled, his dark hair was streaked with gray, but he held himself in a manner that reminded me of Gerson. There was a sureness to him, and absolutely none of the fear the others held.

I held the man's gaze for a minute as we stood among the flowers. Each of us seemed to be waiting for the other to talk. The crowd around us shuffled where they stood. The man seemed to notice their growing impatience and sighed. "Where should I even start?" His voice was similar to Gerson's as well, gravelly and soft, and not at all rushed.

"Start wherever you'd like." I told him, startling more than a few humans around me. "I'll answer any questions you have. And there is much I'd like to tell you as well." My words seemed to put them off more than I'd hoped. Perhaps I should have spoken a little less like the Prince of Monsters. There seemed to be a great difference in formality between our species.

The man before me scratched at his chin. "So, you can speak." He paused as he looked to the crowd, waving a hand to settle them. I took the moment to look closer at the crowd myself. There were a good three dozen humans. Most of them were male and many I would have guessed were younger than the one who spoke to me, though it was hard to tell with humans. I saw the two I had spoken to first. They hid in the back, behind others, still looking as frightened as they had originally. "What are you?" The man asked, drawing my attention back to him.

I thought for a moment. "I am a monster." I said simply.

The man chuckled. "Well, I'm not inclined to disagree with that, but what does that mean, exactly?"

His question confused me. "It means just that. I am a monster, one of many. My name is Asriel Dreemurr, Son of Asgore, Son of Azazel, and I am Prince of Monsters."

"You're saying there's more of you?" Someone in the crowd shouted to my side.

The man who was speaking to me turned as if to snap at the one who had asked the question, but I spoke up first. "Do not worry. I am alone. The rest of my kind is still below. The barrier still stands, which is why I am here now."

The man turned back to me. He looked confused. "I'm sorry, son, you're not making a lot of sense. What do you mean below? What barrier?"

Then it was my turn to be confused. "Do you not remember?" Chara was silent in my head. He offered no insight.

The man shook his head. "No, I'm afraid I don't. Do you mind telling me?"

I opened my mouth to begin explaining, but cut myself short. If the humans did not remember monsters, that it was they that sealed us away out of fear, maybe that would make things easier. I shook my head. "No, it matters little and changes nothing. I came here seeking help. Monsters are trapped behind a magical barrier beneath Mt. Ebbot. We have been trapped for a long time. I seek to break that barrier, but I can't do it alone. All of the monsters in the Underground together could not break what seals us. I need six of you who would be willing to come back with me, who would be willing to help set us free." None of them said anything, and so I added. "There is no need to be worried. We may look scary, but monsters are peaceful creatures. Most of us could not hurt a fly. In fact, some of us closely resemble flies.

The man stared back up to me, his face unreadable. "If it weren't for the fact that I was looking at you, I wouldn't have believed a word you just said." Then he chuckled. "Monsters and magical barriers? It all sounds like the world of a kid whose imagination has run a little too wild. But, I don't believe you're lying to me."

I felt hope rise within me. "Does that mean you'll help?"

There was a moment of pause. "Now, I didn't say that."

"Please," I said, taking a step towards him. Several of the things in the humans' hands were pointing at me again. I got myself back under control before going on. "We have been trapped for nearly a thousand years. This is the first chance we've had to change that. You _have_ to help me."

"Frankly son, no, we don't. I don't know anything about you besides what you've told me, and this is all strange enough that I'm not about to trust you just off of that."

"Why would I lie to you?" I argued.

The man held up a hand. "I already said I didn't think you were lying. But that's not enough. We don't know anything about you monsters for starters. Sure, you can say they're peaceful, but we may have completely different ideas of peace."

I set my jaw, trying to keep my voice level. "I think you'll find that, compared to humans, monsters have a much better grasp on the concept of peace. If you came with me, I could show you."

"And if I came with you, across this barrier and into this 'Underground,' would I not be trapped too?"

I blinked. "I-"

"I'm sorry son," the man said, cutting me off. "I appreciate you trying like this and talking to us, but I think you'll have to find another way."

My desperation was growing. This wasn't working. "Will no one come with me?" I scanned the crowd. No one spoke, and I admitted defeat. "Fine, then I will try elsewhere. Thank you for listening."

"I think you'll find that nobody will be willing to help you." The man added before I could go. "The thought of more of you roaming around probably isn't very appealing to anyone."

I locked eyes with him again, this time I did not hold back my frustration. "And if it were humans who were trapped and they came seeking us for help, would you just accept that?"

The man sighed again. "No," he said. "And that's what I'm afraid of." I thought that the end of it, so I tried to walk past. But the man did not let me by. "Like I said. I'm glad you came to us like this and let us talk, but I think it's time you went back home."

"That sounds like a threat." I said.

"Only if you make us act on it." There were several clicks from the things the humans held. I recognized them now. They were the same as what the other man had used to kill the one in the store.

I felt my hope crumble. I needed to go; I needed to try again elsewhere. But what if everywhere I went it was the same like the man said? No. There was no way this man could speak for all of humanity. I clutched Chara's body to me tighter. I would make this right yet.

"What have you got there?" The man asked me, pointing at the bundle in my arms.

For a moment, I almost told them, my mind on other things. But then I took in their faces again. The fear in their eyes stopped me in my tracks. "Nothing." I said instead.

"Do you mind if I see it then?" The man asked, reaching for the blanket. I pulled back on instinct. The man hesitated, but let his hand drop. "Awfully defensive over nothing." He said. The man stepped up to me again.

"It's my business." I told him plainly.

"If you're going to ask for help from us, I think you should try to be a little more open than that."

"You already said you weren't going to help."

"What are you carrying?" It was clear that the man's patience was running out, and so was my own. These were not the kind of humans I wanted help from anyway. It was time to go and…

There was a faint sound, like the sound of a leaf breaking off from a branch in the breeze, but the one behind me had nothing but buds, and the air had been still. Another came, and then another. The man standing before me looked down at my feet as did many in the crowd. I followed their eyes slowly and saw the cause of the noise. Red dripped down from the bundle in my arms, hitting the ground with a _tick_. It stained the flowers at me feet, beading and then sinking into the petals.

_Blood._ I realized.

The man and I looked back up at one another. He must have known what I was going to do because he lunged forward. I wasn't fast enough to stop him from pulling the blanket and revealing Chara's face. My god, how pale he looked. It almost made me start crying, forgetting the world around me. But someone in the crowd screamed and kept me in the present.

"That's a kid!" I heard one of them shout.

"He killed a kid!" Another added.

"He's trying to trick us!"

"No!" I denied, quickly recovering my brother's face. I couldn't bear to look at it any longer. "I can explain."

"Why should we believe you? You said it yourself, you're a monster." The rest of the crowd growled with their agreement to that opinion. Several of them took steps forward, their fear forgotten.

"Quiet!" The man in front of me shouted. The sound startled me as much as it had the other humans. He looked up at me. I found I couldn't meet his eye. "I've had just about enough of this. Give us the body and leave, and there'll be no fuss. Alright?"

I bit back my anger at their assumptions. Chara, where were you? "I'll leave," I said flatly, "but you can't have him."

The man almost seemed disappointed. "I'm afraid that's not how this is going to work."

My anger surged. I would not allow myself to be bullied, not after everything else. I leveled my gaze with the man. His confidence melted as I glared at him. "I'm afraid there's nothing you can do to stop me." I said, finally letting some of my anger through. Then, there was a loud bang and a white-hot pain shot through my shoulder. I wasn't sure what had happened or what to even do. For a moment I was simply stunned as the echo of the sound crackled through the valley. The pain was gone quickly, but not before my arm went limp and Chara's body fell to the ground.

That was all the excuse the humans needed. They sprinted towards me, towards my brother. I threw myself over him before they could reach. I would not let them take him from me. Then more pain filled me as their blows descended. They shouted and raged as they beat me, trying to get to Chara, the human they thought I killed.

I _had_ killed him, it occurred to me. I had let him die so that we could try to fix things, make them right. That was what I had told myself. But everything was so much worse than I had feared. What had we done any of this for?

The pain of each of their attacks never lasted more than a moment, but it never ended either. I felt it deserved. I looked down at my brother's corpse, face revealed once more in his fall. I smiled a bitter smile and felt tears fall down my face. "I failed you again," I whispered to him. "That's all I ever do, isn't it?"

Then, Chara returned to me.

" _Do you see now?_ " he said. " _This is what humans are like. They reject peace even as it stares them in the face. They jump to conclusions just to keep themselves locked in that circle of hate and violence. To destroy the barrier with them still alive would mean the same for all monsters. Only one can live in this world. Which would you chose?_ "

The joy of my brother's return was tainted by the bitterness of his words. I shook my head to fight them. "It's not right." I whispered.

" _Right? Right? You think the humans care about what's_ right _? Look at what they're doing to us! They attacked us with no reason. They were looking for the slightest excuse to do so from the moment they saw you. They're afraid, and they should be._ " I could feel Chara's anger burn in the back of my mind. It was sharp, focused, and impossibly strong. I had never known anger like this, and I don't know how anyone could. " _They do nothing but destroy this world and everything in it,_ " he went on. " _But now, someone comes that has the power to change that. Someone who can shatter their illusion of peace and power, and so they seek to destroy it before that can happen. They are miserable to watch. Ending them would be a mercy._ "

Blows continued to rain down on me, the pain grew. But still, I shook my head. "I won't do it." I said.

"… _Then I will._ "

Suddenly, my brother's rage washed over me. I felt as if I was being ripped away from my body, my vision swirled and my arms and legs went numb, but I didn't fall. I felt magic build within me, but I had not summoned any. The threads of a spell began to form unbidden, then several. Some of them I didn't even recognize. What was happening?

One of the spells finished and a burst of air knocked the humans away from me, casting them back a good half dozen feet. Then, I stood, though in my shock I had not even tried to move. "I will not suffer this any longer." My voice said. It echoed the words that I heard in my head.

" _Chara?_ " Somehow, my brother had taken control. I had to stop him before he hurt anyone. I tried to fight back against it, but it was like trying to punch through stone.

Another of his spells finished and one of the humans rose up from the ground and into the air. It was the man who had talked to us. He looked as if he was in pain, but his jaw was clamped shut, and he made no noise. "I was wrong to ever think there was hope for us." My brother said through me. "I see that now. I was hoping you would too." I could feel whatever spell my brother had on the human tighten. I redoubled my efforts to try to stop him, frantically trying to take back my body. "Perhaps you'll at least be able to accept it once it's done."

" _Noooooo!_ " I roared, sending with it a tide of fear and desperation, and Chara's resistance shattered. I felt the feeling in my limbs return, my vision sharpen. I quickly undid the spell my brother had on the man. He fell to the ground in a heap and did not stir. I looked around. The rest of the humans still lay on the ground as well. Some of them groaned as they tried to stand back up. I could feel my fear and my guilt build into a state of panic. I knelt down and rewrapped Chara's body. Picking him up gently, I fled back into the forest. I spared one looked back at the hill before I pushed down my regret and began to make my way back up the mountain.

" _What are you doing?_ " My brother whispered in my head again. I could still feel his anger smoldering.

"Going back." I told him. "We've blundered enough for one day."

I crunched through the leaves as the mountain began to rise before me. I felt a pang of sorrow as I looked up at it. I did not want to go back empty handed, but what else could I do?

" _Why are you being so stupid?_ "

"I'm being stupid?" I shouted in the silence of the forest. "I'm not the one trying to commit genocide! I'm trying to make things right! I'm trying to make the best out of this mess that _you_ put us in! So shut up! We'll figure something else out when we get home."

There was silence. " _Is that really what you think?_ " Chara said.

"What else should I think?" I said in my anger. "If it wasn't for your crazy and stupid idea, we'd be eating lunch with mom and dad right now. We would be happy!"

"… _You idiot._ "

And with those words, I felt my brother vanish. It was not like before, where Chara had simply become quiet. He simply felt gone, like I was alone in my body once again. That scared me more than the humans bellow, and I paused. "Chara?" I called out, but nothing changed. The silence of the forest now seemed almost crushing. "Chara?" I tried again, straining to see or feel anything. But there was nothing.

My panic resurfaced, far stronger than it had been on that hill. I began to think that Chara was truly somehow gone. Everything that I had just said to him came back to me. "Chara, I didn't mean it!" There was no response, no anything. I couldn't bear it. I couldn't be alone, not at that moment, not on top of everything else. Angry at my brother or not, I couldn't lose him now. Not again.

And so, I followed after.


	11. The Second Betrayal

I was somehow pulled into my own head. A part of me recognized that to be the truth behind what happened, the same part that knew that I was actually still walking up the side of the mountain with my brother clutched to my chest, and the same part that knew that everything that happened after wasn't actually real. But by god, if it didn't feel real…

This is the part where it all gets a bit strange, but I swear this is what I saw. I do not exaggerate to any degree. And to be honest, I wish I was. Much of it is hard to remember. Even now, I don't like thinking about it. But, I've made it this far, I might as well finish this story.

I can already tell you're not going to believe me, so I'll say this: you humans have such a very loose grasp of magic and what it can do. Its very nature defies the logic you cling so tightly to. And the nature of souls is stranger still. You really shouldn't even be surprised that something like this could happen… Even if I find myself doubting it sometimes.

But, wish as I might that it was real or not real, wishes don't change the truth. They don't change memories…

I'm stalling, I realize that. I've never gone this far when reliving this tale to myself. I always stop somewhere in the middle, when I could still hold in my head that things were alright, that things could get better. Why am I saying all of this now, I wonder. Why am I even bothering? Why force myself to relive this pain on top of all the others?

No, this needs to be remembered. I'm the only one left who was there, and someone needs to hold on to the truth. Let's get this over with.

It's not that hard, really. Hide the pain, put on a smile, and start the show. Just like Chara taught me.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is how I died.

 

The first place I found myself was the castle. I took in the familiar stone walls with confusion. I was somewhere on the middle levels, in a part where Chara and I would often come to play because it was often empty and far away enough from mom and dad that they wouldn't catch us doing thing we shouldn't have been. I remember it looking so real that I believed I was actually there. Then, I began to notice that something wasn't right. The stone, the tile, the light coming in from the windows, it all looked… muted. Every part of my surroundings looked like they had been wrung of their color before being placed back exactly where they had been. I became wary, expecting something to happen at any second.

The paintings on the wall were blurry, like the artist had tried to recreate their masterpiece after almost going blind, or like my own eyes just refused to focus on them. They looked more wrong that that though. I felt like they weren't even the paintings that should have been there. For some reason, that unsettled me more than anything else, and I felt I had to figure out why. The answer seemed within my reach, if I could only focus on them… But just looking at them made my head hurt for some reason. I turned away and focused instead on my purpose for being there.

"Chara!" I called out. It was my old voice, not the voice of my new body. I looked down and found that I was indeed back to my old self. My voice echoed unnaturally down the hallway, pulling me away from the changes to myself. My fur stands on end, unnerving me. I can't shake the feeling that I'm suddenly being watched. "Chara?" I called out again, not as loud as the first time. I was afraid to raise my voice again; afraid it would give signal to whatever horror I felt was hiding in the shadows. I shook my head, trying to convince myself that that wasn't true, that there was nothing there. It was not as easy as it should have been.

As I called out again, I began to feel something, a now almost familiar pressure at the back of my mind, and I knew immediately that it was my brother. He was not back in my head, though, he was out there. The pressure seemed to be pulling me towards him. I looked around, and was able to pinpoint that he was somewhere below me. I wasted no time. I raced through the halls, more often than not running to the wall as I rounded corners. All thought of unseen watchers was forgotten. I took steps two at a time as I reached them and sometimes skipped whole flights altogether; anything to move faster and get to my brother quicker. Down and down I went, one floor than five then ten, and yet Chara seemed to get no closer. I kept descending, but nothing changed. I was still in the middle floors of the castle. How could that be? I knew I must have been near the ground floor by that point.

I paused and looked out a nearby window, trying to get my bearings. I thought that maybe in my rush I had simply miscounted floors, but it did not take me long to realize that something more than that was wrong. As I looked out, I saw that everything beyond the window was not as it should have been. New Home was gone; the view that sat beyond the window was little more than a gray mist, thick and unrevealing. The mist clung to the wall of the castle, obscuring anything that was more than just a few feet away. As I looked down, the wall looked like it could still go on forever. I had no idea how far away from the bottom I was, but that did not stop me.

I spared it no more thought than that. Shaking my head, I turned away from the window and continued searching for my brother. My confidence did not last long, however. More floors down and it was still the same. Was Chara running away from me? No, he hadn't moved, somehow I knew that. So I kept on, trying to focus on that feeling of him and continuing to ignore the unnaturalness of my surroundings. And then things began to get worse.

I started to hit dead ends where they should not have been. Hallways I had run through hundreds of times were no longer meeting up as I remembered. This became more frequent until I was getting turned around more often than not. The light in the hallways seemed to dim each time I was turned around, and where the light made everything muted, the darkness seemed to cling far too strongly to everything. The shadows cast began to dance unnaturally in the corner of my eye. I pushed it out of my mind; all that mattered was finding Chara, yet still he felt no closer to me than he had when I started. I ground my teeth in frustration. What was even going on?

I started hearing whispers. Unintelligible words pricked at my concentration, drawing my eye back to the unnaturalness of my surroundings and eating away at my resolve as they did. Panic began to build as I ran until I was running more so to get away from the voices then I was to get to my brother, but the moment I realized what was happening, I quelled it and pushed on.

Then, I heard a noise: a deep throated growl that seemed to shake the very stone beneath my feet. I stopped at a cross between two hallways that should not have been there in the first place. The whispers had gone silent, and somehow that was more alarming than when they had come in the first place. I strained to listen for the source of the noise.

There was something about it, familiar and foreign at the same time. It shocked me to stillness; cut right through any rational thought right to the part of the mind fueled only by instinct. _Do not move!_ That part seemed to scream at me. _To move means death._

The growl did not come again, but there was a new noise. It was a voice, far enough off that I couldn't hear the words but knew that was what it was. I turned in the direction I heard it, but I didn't take a step. I didn't even dare draw breath as I stood, waiting for it to come closer.

That's what I was doing: waiting for it. Why? I should have been trying to get as far away as possible.

I was afraid, I realized. I had never been more afraid in my life. There is not much in the lives of monsters that one need be afraid of, so I was almost unaccustomed to it. The sound of that voice though… it was… Unnatural doesn't do it justice.

You know what I've found people to think is scarier than anything else? More so than monsters and pain and whatever irrational phobias they develop for inexplicable reasons? It's when something is _just slightly_ off from the norm. A little detail they can't pinpoint, yet they know something is wrong. So they search for it, becoming more and more panicked as they continue to be unable to find it so that by the time they do, that little detail has become the most frightening thing in existence.

It's unfortunate really, because it works on monsters a lot less than it does on humans. Humans love to find patterns and connections were there aren't any. They're almost too easy. It can be as simple as a word said one too many times, or a shadow out of place or a smile just a little wider than it should be. They could be reading something and find words that they believe are meant only for them, even though that would be impossible… There's nothing behind you, by the way.

The scariest things in the world are the things we conjure up in our heads; the things that are so much worse than they are in reality. The things that begin to make us distrust in that reality.

And the only things scarier than that are the things where the reality turns out to be so much worse than you could even imagine. And let me tell you, things like that exist.

I knew I should run; hide, before whatever owned that voice managed to find me. I no longer felt like those halls were part of my home. Wherever I was, this domain was theirs, and I was the intruder. I feared hearing that voice again. I knew the next time I did, if I wasn't ready, I wouldn't be able to hold back my fear. I would scream, and it would find me.

_Move!_ The part of my mind that was still rational screamed. It almost seemed like it was far off. _Chara._ I tried to focus on my brother. _I have to find Chara!_ My hands clenched into fists, the effort that alone took was momentous, but it was a start. I shut my eyes trying to fix on Chara's image and push away thoughts of whatever had made that noise. But another noise robbed me of my concentration: a wet squish from down the hall. My eyes shot open against my will and I saw, gathered in the distance, this… disfigured shadow.

I was running before I knew it. I had no idea what it was – I had never seen its like before – but I had no intention of finding out. I sprinted through the halls faster than I had before. I no longer had a thought for the fading light or the unfamiliarity of the passages or finding my brother. The only thing that burned itself into my thoughts was getting away from that shadow.

It had seen me. I knew for a fact that at the last moment I saw a pair of eyes in the middle of that shadow, and they had locked with mine, radiating this sinister hunger. I knew it was following me. I couldn't hear any trace of it, but I knew. And so I ran.

The hallway ran straight for a long time. Eventually, I hit another dead end. There was very little light left at that point. I began to feel panic return to me. Had I passed any other paths? I didn't remember seeing any, but maybe I missed one. Did I risk going back to look? The feeling that that creature was still following me did not waiver. I decided I needed to hide.

The walls were lined with wooden cupboards. In the castle, they were meant to hold different tapestries while they were not in use, as well as candles for the sconces and means to light them. Here, the same one repeated over and over. It was like every aspect of the same ten foot span of wall had been replicated and placed in an endless line. That should have unnerved me more that it had at that moment, but the only thing that mattered was hiding. I chose one at random and opened it. It was empty. I crawled inside, and tried to be silent.

I don't know how long I was hiding in there. Long enough that I began to doubt what I felt. Perhaps the creature had not seen me, and that feeling of pursuit had just been my imagination, but it didn't matter. Panic had me rooted where I sat, my legs curled up to my chest, my eyes staring at the sliver of half-light that came between the doors. No matter how many times I tried to tell myself I was fine, it didn't work. In fact, it made me feel worse. Focusing on it didn't help, but I couldn't think about anything else. It stretched moments out to an eternity. And with every passing second, it became harder not to start shaking. I could feel tears falling down my cheeks.

On and on I waited, frozen in that terror. I began to wish it would find me already so I could be done with this fear. I didn't care if it killed me anymore, I couldn't take being in that box anymore. I could still feel Chara, far away. Where was he? Where had he gone? I had to find him. Creature or no creature, I have to _move_!

The moment I convinced myself that creature was not coming and I reached to push the door open, I heard it. _Squish… squish._ I stiffened, had I just been hearing things? I waited. There was silence. I tried to see out of the narrow slit between the doors, and as I leaned closer, a shadow fell across the light. I pressed myself as far back into the cupboard as I could, cursing myself for possibly making noise. I couldn't help it.

The shadow remained still, and I forced myself not to move as well. I wondered what it was doing. Had it heard me? Did it know I was here? Was it waiting for me to come out? Why?

Then it spoke. And in that voice that I knew if I heard again I would lose any control over myself, it said, "Come out, come out, wherever you are." I threw my hands over my mouth to stop myself from screaming, somehow managing to hold on to some semblance of my sanity. The air seemed to go rancid as it spoke, as if its very breath brought decay.

The shadow retreated. Light returned as I heard it slowly step away from my hiding place. _Squish… squish._ Then it stopped again, I could still hear it breathing. I had no idea what was going to happen. I wished I still had that ability to send myself away, but it didn't work, not in that place. I squeezed my eyes shut, unable to take any of it any longer.

There was a crash, the sound of wood splintering. It was sudden enough to make me jump. Thankfully, one sound covered the other. The creature must have destroyed one of the other cupboards. It was searching for me. The crash came again, this time from the other side of the one I hid in. How had it gotten there so fast? I didn't even see a shadow cross me. Could there be more than one? Somehow, that idea seemed impossible even in this place. Such an aspect of horror could not be replicated. At least, that was what I thought then.

Another crash, then another, and then another; all around me. I kept thinking it must be mine turn next. Would it hurt? Would it kill me? Would I even have long enough to see it coming, to know it was happening?

Then it was gone. I didn't know how I knew that, but I was sure. I opened my eyes. The crack of light was still there, as was I. I reached out to the doors and then hesitated, fearing some trick or that it would simply come back. Finally, I worked up the courage to push forward, though I'm not quite sure where it came from.

I peeked out; the hallway was empty. There was no sign of any of the destruction I had heard, or that the creature had even been there. Something else was different: the dead end was gone. I could feel my brother down the now open hall. Not wanting to stay in that place any longer, I started to run again.

I must have descended the castle's height three times over and still I felt no closer to my brother. As I went on, the changes began to grow once more. Halls no longer met at right angles or were no longer level but sloped up or down. The gray mist outside had retreated. I did not dare stop to look, but I could see buildings as tall as the ones in the city on the surface as I passed by windows, backlit by a red sky.

Something was very wrong, I knew that, but I continued to ignore the changes. All that mattered was finding Chara, getting him back. Then, space began to warp further. The walls split, bending and meeting at impossible angles. The ceiling becomes a mirror of the floor. Hallways met one another from above and below.

Like broken glass, reality itself seemed shattered. I could no longer tell which way was up or which way was forward. I simply tried to keep myself on a singular path, one that took me in the direction I could sense Chara from. He became the only sense of orientation I had left, a guiding light in a sea of chaos.

Suddenly, all of the hallways converged at a singular end point, and I could go no further. I could still feel Chara beyond the wall, was he closer? I couldn't tell. But there was no way forward. I couldn't stop, not after everything. I turned back down another hall, and then another, certain I was going in the right direction again, but I was simply looped back to the dead end. I tried a different way, but it was the same. There were plenty of options to try, and I was not going to give up until I found him. I began to pass by doors, but none of them felt like they would lead me closer to him, so I passed them by.

Time and time again, my path looped me back to the same end. I began to grow frustrated, but I continued on. My impatience kept me moving forward, but it would also almost get me killed.

I heard the creature again before I saw it. The sound of its footsteps was unforgettable. I skidded to a halt and looked around. There was nowhere to hide this time, but there was another door to my side. I knew it would take me further from my purpose, but I had no choice. I could not meet that creature. If I saw it, that would be the end.

I stepped through the door…

 

…and found myself on a bridge. I glanced around. I was back on the surface. It was night again; the sky above my head held no stars, the city in the distance was dark as. There was only the moon. It seemed to glow red as it stared down at me. The bridge I was on, a giant structure that looked to be woven from metal, was suspended over a river, wider than I would have ever thought possible before coming to the surface. It stretched almost to the horizon on either side of me, seeming to float over the world. I stood at its edge, toes dangling over the dark water far below. The air was chilled and made colder by the wind which seemed to want to push me over the edge. _Jump,_ it seemed to say. _Jump and it will all be over._ I thought the idea ridiculous. "No," I told it. "Not until I find Chara."

_Why?_ It whispered back. _All you've ever done is fail him. If you found him again, what makes you think it will be different this time?_

The words stunned me. "I…"

_You're just being selfish. You don't have a single thought about him, what you're doing to him; the pain you cause him. You simply kept pressing him and pressing him until he finally broke, and then you screamed at him like it was all his fault when you only have yourself to blame. Now, how is that fair? How is that deserving of another chance?_

I didn't have a response. It was right. What good had I done for my brother? Every time I thought I was helping him, it only made his life worse. Why did I keep trying?

_Let all of this pain end._ The wind said. _Let him rest. Jump._

I watched myself creep closer to the edge. I stared down at the water. It almost seemed inviting. Was it warm? I wondered. Maybe this should be the end. What could possibly still be made from all of our mistakes? Perhaps everyone would be better off.

Everyone…

"No!" I shouted, turning away from the ledge. I couldn't leave them alone. My mom and my dad, all monsters. I was the only one who could change life for them now. I had made my decision and I would see it through to the end. "There's always the chance to try again." I told the wind, and it went silent, retreating back to wherever it had come. In one of the metal beams, I saw a door like the one I used to get there. I stepped up to it, confidence restored, and went through…

 

… I was in a living room. A laurel pattern couch sat before a large glass screen. The floor was covered in a gray carpet and the walls were painted a pale peach. Light came from a single lamp sitting on small table next to the couch. The room was empty but for that furniture; there was nothing on the walls and there were no widows. There was only a singular door on the other side of the room, closed.

It was also silent. Now, I don't mean it was quiet. It. was. _Silent._ The room seemed to reject the very existence of sound. I blinked, and the sound seemed to tear at my ears, grind at my sanity. I couldn't breathe; I couldn't move. I dared not do either. I wasn't like before when I was being stalked by the creature and had to stay quiet to not be discovered. This room felt as if silence was the only thing keeping it together, and to shatter that would shatter everything within, myself along with it.

My gaze shifted to the door at the other end of the room. Even just my eyes moving seemed to crack louder than a whip. Chara was somewhere on the other side of that door. I knew it. I don't know how I had missed getting this close, but that hardly seemed to matter. I was trapped. The door was barely a dozen feet from me, but it might as well have been on the other side of the Underground.

No, I would not be stopped now. And definitely not by something like this. I took a step. The sound it made was so loud it to my ears I had to bite back a scream of pain. It seemed to echo through the room, the walls shifting and groaning as the sound passed through them. They pulsed with the sound, or rather away from it, denying it. I stayed still again and everything thing seemed to settle. I took another step, much slower this time, stretching my movements out to minimize the noise. The sound wasn't loud enough to hurt this time, but it was still almost deafening. The walls still seemed to throb, but far less than with my first step. I tried speeding up, but it only made things worse. I went as fast as I could without feeling like something would go wrong.

It took me more than a minute to finish that single step. I was still a long way from the door. I tried to work out how long it would take for me to get to it. I would have to go around the couch which stood in my path. _Too long_ , I decided. I didn't have time for this. What if Chara disappeared on me? I still didn't know how he had gotten so close. No, I would not let impatience risk everything now.

I made my way across the room, slowly, trying my best to ignore the shifting while still keeping enough of an eye on it to see if anything changed. I don't know how long it took in the end. It felt like hours. There was a time when I thought the room was growing as I tried to get closer, but I dismissed it as fantasy and moved on. Finally, I made it to the door. I laid my hand on the handle and turned it slowly, compared to everything else, the sound of the handle's mechanisms moving seemed dull and muffled. The door opened, and the silence on the room broke. My ears rung as a bubble seemed to pop around me. I spared one last look into the room, it didn't seem so unnatural now. I smiled, and let out a breath I had been holding since I got in the room.

As I did, the walls opened. Dozens of bloodshot, red eyes scanned the room before locking on to me. They were the same eyes as the ones on the creature. I slammed the door closed, shutting that room away forever. That was when the screaming started.

That was all there was where I found myself then: screaming. Screams of pain, screams of anger, of terror; they were so strong they became physical. Streaks of blood red and bruise purple smoke danced in echo to their wails. They seemed to cast shadows on my eyes. The shadows took the shape of faces, moaning against their existence. Shutting my eyes did nothing to rid me of them.

The screams felt like they were beating against me. Their agony became my own. I fell to my knees as my legs gave out. I felt like I was being crushed and burned and beaten all at the same time. But Chara was close, I could feel him. I stood against the agony, trying to withstand its tidal force. I nearly blacked out just from trying to get to my feet, but I held on. _So close_ I told myself, just a little more.

The screams battered at me and I kept my eyes fixed forward. I felt that if I looked down, I would find there was nothing left of me, just a mass of light that would quickly turn to dust. I took another step and almost stumbled. My strength was giving out. It hurt so much I want to give up.

_No! I refuse to give up now!_

"Chara!" I called out, and the screams silenced.

A light came, popping into existence as if it had always been there and I had simply missed it. A figure was crouched within it. My face split into a grin and I stood, pain forgotten. "Chara!" I cried again. He was there, huddled in the center of the light.

I ran to him, but I hesitated. He was in one of his hushes. Should I wait? No, we needed to get out of there before anything else happened. And there was still that creature. I reached out to my brother, but before I could lay a hand on him, his head rose. Blood-filled eyes stared back at me. As they took me in, red tears started to run down them. It smiled. I flinched back. The figure stood, smile widening; blood dripped from its mouth as well.

"I'm surprised you made it this far," it said. Then its smile was gone. "You should have stayed away." Its voice was low and raspy; much like Chara's was moments before his death. But this… thing, this wasn't my brother. I knew that as surely as I knew where to find him just moments before.

"Who are you?" I demanded. "Where is Chara?" I tried to hide the fear from my voice, but was likely unsuccessful.

The figure laughed. "What's wrong, Asriel? Don't recognize me?" The figure that claimed to be Chara took a step forward and I took another back.

"No," I denied. "You're not him."

"No, I am not," the figure agreed. The admission seemed to shock even it. It drew back and started to circle around me. "I am what kept him going until his death." It said.

"What do you mean?" I asked, trying to keep my eye on it.

The figured laughed again. "We've both had the same lessons, don't you remember? In order for a soul to persist after death, it must be… unnatural, it must be unaccepted. A delicate balance we had to overcome, considering we did this willingly. The flowers were the first part, but we didn't know how long it would take… the pain it would cause. He started to give up, you see, accept death to escape the pain since you were so unwilling to end it for us." Those last words dripped with accusation. For a moment I thought the figure might attack me, but it seemed surprised by its own actions. Regaining itself, it went on. "But he realized that wouldn't work, he needed to hold on. Do you know what kept him going? It was his anger, his hate for humanity, and the thought that he would finally have the power to see an end to their horrible ways. I allowed him to forge his will in the fires of that agony, to hold on to his determination."

As I listened, suddenly the pieces were beginning to come together. I wanted to deny what this figure had to say, but it made sense. Chara's changes once we were on the surface… "Was that why he was like that?" I asked myself.

"Indeed. When you came together, he thought that you would understand immediately. He thought that you hated them just as much as him, after what he had told you of his past. But, now we're here. And now you, the one person he thought he could trust in this world, has proven once again to have betrayed him."

I shook my head in denial of the figures words. "How could you possibly think I could agree to killing all of humanity?"

"Why do you still refuse to see?" The figure was beginning to sound frustrated. "I've shown you the atrocities they've committed; you've even witnessed a few of them yourself. There is no hope of saving them. Even if there were, they would not deserve it."

"Where are you hiding Chara?" I demanded, refusing to listen to this any longer.

"Did you really think I would let you have him now, after everything?" it roared. "No! All you've ever done is hurt him! I won't let you have him again."

"None of that was my fault! I didn't mean to hurt him."

"It changes nothing." It said. "Leave. Go do whatever it is you think will save monsters, and when you realize you're wrong and come crawling back to him on hands and knees, maybe then I'll let him forgive you."

"I'm not going anywhere without Chara." I told it.

"I said stay away!" The figure roared once again. An image flashed through my mind. One of Chara looking like a cornered animal. I remember it from the first day I met him. Back then, I knew it was not anger behind those eyes, but fear. Just as it was now.

But why? Why was this thing, this supposed embodiment of Chara's anger, frightened?

I smirked. "You're afraid of _me_." I told it. "You know that if I get to him, I'll make him realize he doesn't need you anymore."

The figures expression did not change. "You're fooling yourself if you think that's the truth." It said.

"Oh, I know it's the truth." I took a step forward and it backed away, becoming defensive. Suddenly that feeling that Chara was nearby returned. My smirk turned into a smile. "Why else would you be keeping him from me?" I added. I took another step forward. This time the figure tried to block me, looking like it might strike at any moment. "I'm not afraid of you," I told it. "You're not even close to the worst thing I've seen all day."

"Why do you keep going like this?" The figure whispered. "Why can't you see when you're wrong?"

"I'm not wrong." I told it. "And neither is Chara. I do understand his anger, but that doesn't justify killing. If nothing else, it would make us no better than them. Worse, it would prove that they were right to seal us away a thousand years ago. They just need to be shown that there are other ways to live. Just like Chara does, so I'll start with him."

I stepped past the figure. It tried to stop me, but I walked through it as if it were smoke in the direction I could feel my brother. "Do you honestly think humans will give you a chance to try to change them?" The figure argued, trailing after me in its continued attempts to dissuade. "You have no idea how quickly they are capable of destroying you, even without magic."

"Then I will protect monsters, as is my duty."

"And what if you can't?"

"I can." I could see him now, huddled on the ground like I had found him that first day. As I stepped into the light that surrounded him, the figure roared one last time and then vanished.

I knelt down next to my brother, gently placing a hand on his shoulder. "Chara?" I said softly. "It's okay now. I'm here. We can go back." His shoulders started to shake. He was crying. "I'm sorry I yelled at you. I didn't mean any of that." I pulled him up so he was sitting on his knees. "Come on. Let's get out of here." I didn't think that creature would come back or any of the other horrors in this place, but I didn't want to test that either.

"Why?" Chara whispered before I could pull him to his feet. "Why are you doing this to me?"

I blinked, and suddenly we were both standing in a field of golden flowers. Mountains rose around us in the distance. I did not recognize this place, but Chara seemed to regard it reverently. That was when I first realized could not feel my brother's emotions anymore. The pocket at the back of my head that I had quickly grown to distinguish as him was gone. I felt as empty as I did standing atop the mountain.

I was not longer standing next to him. Chara stood a few paces from me, eyes turning to meet me. I didn't need to feel his emotions to recognize the sorrow he felt. "Why won't you just leave me alone and let this end?" he asked me.

"Chara…" I began, reaching out to him. He turned away and I lowered my arm. "I would never leave you like this. I'm going to bring you back."

"Why?" He asked again without looking up at me. "So you can just cause me more pain?"

I stared at my brother's back. I wanted to run over and hug him, to tell him everything would be okay. But unfortunately, most matters in life aren't so easy to solve, no matter what some monsters may tell you. "I would never mean to do that…" I told my brother.

"It doesn't matter what you 'mean' to do," he said, "you always end up doing it anyway."

A small part of me was hurt by his words, even though they were not ones I hadn't heard before, even if the last time I had heard them was when Chara had not been in his right mind. But, even if I now knew that those words were not just the agonized ravings of my brother, more than anything I was growing frustrated. Why did everything feel the need to remind me constantly of my mistakes? "I know," I told him. "I know I keep messing up, and I know that saying I'm sorry doesn't make up for it. I came here to say that anyway, to bring you back and try again. I want to help you, Chara, but you need to tell me what I'm doing wrong, otherwise I'm just going to keep messing up. But I _do_ want to help you. You're my brother and I love you. I want you to be happy. I want to make it so you never need to hide behind that… thing ever again."

For some reason, my brother laughed. "That 'thing'?" he mocked. "There is no 'thing.' Don't you get it? That was just supposed to scare you off. All of it was just to try to get you to leave. But you always were tenacious, weren't you?"

I stared at my brother in disbelief. He turned back to me and I saw that he wasn't lying. "I don't understand." I said, voice shaking slightly.

"No, you never did." Chara said. "I'm done, Asriel. I'm so tired… I'm so sick of everything I do going wrong, and everything I want being torn away from me. But I can't rest. Not while the power to achieve what I'd always really wished for is within my reach. I was hoping you would understand, just this once, so I could do what needed to be done. But now even that has been all but taken from me. Go and do what you think is right. I don't care anymore."

"Chara…" To hear my brother say these things was tearing me to pieces. To think that he had fallen so far. "You can't just give up now!" I argued. "Why can't things just go back to normal?"

"Normal?" he said, suddenly angry. "What the hell is 'normal' to you? To me it's looking over my shoulder every minute. It's waking up in the middle of the night screaming because you dreamt you were back in that hell you thought you finally escaped. It's living with people who you know hate you. It's holding yourself back constantly because nobody wants to see the real you. Even down there I still spent more time in fear than not, don't you understand that? There were even times when I thought that being with my family was easier than life with you. At least up there I knew that everyone was just trying to hurt me. But with monsters I always had to worry. It wasn't the happy dream you seem to think it was, Asriel. What makes you think I just want to go back to that?"

I had no response. My brother's words made me want to drown in my guilt. Had I really been so blind to my brother's pain? I must have been, after all, here we were.

"You still don't understand why I did this, do you?" Chara went on. "Why I killed myself just to try to undo humanity. Then let me explain.

"I loved you, Asriel. You were the first person I met who was nice to me, who I actually believed was good. And, for a while, I tried to believe as you did, that there was hope for me, hope for humans. But I was wrong about them, and you were wrong about me; there's too much of my father in me to ever be good. I know that now, even though I hate it. That's why I gave myself up. It was the only way I knew I could stop myself from hurting those I cared about, and still get everything I ever wanted: to see the world as you do, and to see humans get what they deserve. And at the same time, I would be able to help you fulfill your dream of setting monsters free. It didn't seem like that bad of a deal, really…"

I shook my head. "That's not what I wanted. All I've ever wanted was for you to be happy."

Chara smiled. "Stop lying to yourself, Asriel. Even if that were true, that's no way someone should live…" He looked away, staring down at the flowers at his feet. "There's no hope for humans, and I'm no exception. Even after I thought all of my expectations for them had been crushed, still they managed to disappoint and infuriate me. I tried to tell you that you were wasting your time, but you didn't listen. At first it made me happy, but now it just makes me angry that you refuse to see the truth. If that barrier falls, either they must be destroyed or monsters will be. You should be able to see that by now, and yet you deny it. Why?"

"Because it isn't right! No one should have the power to decide that. Especially not us!"

My brother chuckled. "There's that word again… Asriel, your morals are useless in the real world. Do you think that killing somehow makes someone evil? Do you think that Asgore has not killed anyone? That mom did not before they were sealed away, if the world were truly like what the old stories describe? There is no good and evil, there is only desire and power. The desire for a different world, and the power to see it made a reality. It is those with power that decide what is good or bad, and we are now the most power being that exists. Why should we not cast judgment?"

"Mom and dad would never…" I started to argue. But Chara cut me off.

"Why do you think they were so determined to try to stop you from coming here?" he posed. "It's because they know it too. They agree with me. Humans and monsters cannot coexist, they've seen it firsthand. They know the truth better than anyone else alive."

"Then we won't destroy the barrier!" I yelled. "We'll stay underground."

Chara shook his head. "No, Asriel. I won't let you do that to yourself. There is only one way that this can end. And if you won't let me do it. You'll have to do it yourself."

My thoughts were in shambles. This was all too much, too fast. "No… I-I can't… I…" I stumbled.

Chara let out a breath. "I was hoping it wouldn't come to this." He was before me in an instant, crouched low. Instinct took over immediately; I recognized that stance. I spun out of the way just as Chara's hand cut through the air where I was. He held a knife in his hand. When he saw that his attack had failed, he stood up and locked me with a cold glare.

"Chara, what are you…?" I began.

"I was going to wait until you let your guard down; stay hidden in the corner of your mind. Then, I would take control and kill them whether you agreed or not. But, since you're here, I may as well do it now. Maybe, I could still even convince you that I'm right." He cut at me again. This time I grabbed his wrist as the knife came at my face from the side. I knocked the knife away with my other hand. Chara broke free from my grip. A new knife appeared to take the place of the old one "I will not give up," he maintained. "Not until every last one of them is dead. If you won't help me, then stay out of my way!"

He came at me again, and I readied myself, seeing no way to avoid it. We were both well out of practice, but it all came back to me quickly enough. Chara charged with his knife's point poised for my chest, just as I knew he would. I waited until the last second then turned to the side again. I kept my foot in his path and he tripped over it. I turned to restrain him as he fell, but he was gone. A rustle from behind alerted me. I rolled to the side and sprung up, tackling Chara before he could recover. But, when I hit the ground, he wasn't under me.

"I forgot how good you were at this." Chara said, standing before me as I got up. A smug smile split his features. He seemed to be genuinely enjoying this.

"Always better than you." I said mirthlessly.

"That's because I was holding back. I was always afraid I would hurt you accidentally. But I don't care about that anymore." He came at me again. For all his words, he didn't seem to be doing anything differently. He sliced for my neck and I quickly blocked his wrist with my own, but this time I was knocked away. I was sent reeling to the ground as a result of my block. Dazed, I tried to stand, but Chara was already standing over me. Instead, I flipped back and sprung to my feet. My brother looked amused. "I hated it when we used to spar." He said. "I had convinced myself it was because I didn't want to fight with you, but the more I thought about it I realized that I hated it because of how smug you looked. So overconfident… It's time you learned you're not invincible!"

Chara disappeared before my eyes. I scanned the field for him, but there was no one else there but me. Then he was before me. His knife once again struck for my chest and I dodged; there was no way I was going to be blown back by blocking again. As I spun, I brought my leg up to kick Chara in the side, but once more he was not where he should have been and my kick made me over balanced. I fell right into Chara's attack. I managed to jump out of the way at the last second, but his blade tore through my sleeve and sent pain shooting up and down my arm.

I reset, hand over my injured arm and staring my brother down. How was he moving like that? I asked myself. Was it this place? I had no time to puzzle it out. Chara charged at me again. I had had quite enough by that point. Did not move to dodge or block that time, I simply raised my hand.

Chara's knife disintegrated before it reached me and I caught his hand in my own. He looked up at me, surprised, but more amused than anything. "You used _that_ against me?" he asked. "How could you?"

"It's over." I told him, ignoring his goading.

My brother laughed. "No, Asriel, this is just the beginning." I was so focused on Chara's face that I didn't notice the knife until it slid into my side. I looked down slowly as pain overtook my anger. Chara's other hand was buried in my shirt. He pulled it free as I saw it, white light streamed from the wound. My legs went numb and I fell to my knees. Chara knelt down and lifted my head. "I will win this." I heard him say as my vision faded and thought fled. "I will make you see."

 

I thought I was dead; surely I must have been. But I couldn't remember why. Slowly, feeling returned to me and I was confused. Then came pain. The back of my head was aflame. For some reason, that seemed wrong. My vision returned, fuzzy at first, followed by my hearing.

There was a roar. No, there were many roars; a chorus of voices coming from behind me. The wordless shouts seemed as wrong as the pain. I could see nothing but gray. I tried to blink away the blurriness, and the gray became stone. I was looking at the ground, I realized. I was on my hands and knees. Why?

I looked up, and what I saw horrified me. Above, on a platform, my mom and dad were bound by chains, their eyes downcast. Two humans were pointing things at their heads. I looked behind me to the source of the roars. There was a vast crowd to my back, below me; I was on a platform as well. The crowd was made up of both humans and monsters but they were separated, cut off from one another. We were in a city on the surface. Tall buildings surrounded the courtyard where this madness was taking place. It didn't make sense, but why?

As I looked back at my parents, a man stepped into my view. He looked aged, gray peppered his dark hair and those eyes looked strangely familiar to me. "The law is very clear, Prince Asriel." The man said down to me as if continuing a conversation that we had already started. His voice carried over the crowd, amplified by some unknown means. "A monster used magic to harm a human. The punishment is death." The man spoke like he was lecturing an unruly child. The crowd grew louder at his words. "Now, both the king and queen have volunteered to be taken in the monster's place. But, only one need die. Since you seem so eager, my young prince, we'll have you choose."

I looked at the man in shock. What was he talking about?

Then, memories came flooding into me. The barrier had fallen, and monsters had met with humans for the first time in a thousand years. At first, peace had seemed possible. We had been allowed homes, rights, and a place for ourselves amongst their world. But, in the years that followed, those rights had been stripped from us so slowly that we had hardly noticed until a monster could barely leave their homes without being accused of violating some law supposedly meant to protect humans. I remember thinking how unfair it was, every day. I remember thinking that we should do something, but my brother was always quick to remind me that we could do nothing. They were too strong; we stood no chance.

And now it had come to this. It was a farce, I knew it. They were trying to make an example of monsters, scare us into never defying them again. When my parents said they would take the poor monster's place, they had eaten it up. I was outraged. I had attacked the stage, but they brought me down with almost no effort at all.

"Choose, Asriel." The man said again. "Which will live, the king or the queen? Justice must be served."

What could I do? There had to be some way out of this. This was not justice, it was madness! This was not how the world was supposed to work. It wasn't fair. It wasn't right…

"Fine, if you will not choose," the man went on. He turned from me and gestured to the humans above. "Kill them both."

"No, wait!" I cried out. The man held up a hand to forestall his order. He turned back to me. Tears were streaming down my face now. "Please… please don't kill my mom."

"Asriel, no!" My mom shouted down to me. I looked up at her. She looked panicked. She was crying as well. My dad said nothing; he seemed resigned. He was even smiling.

The man nodded. "So be it," he said emotionlessly. He waved to the human standing over my father. There was a loud bang and my father was gone in cloud of dust. A small light hung where he had been. The human drew a sword and split it in two. Then the light faded into nothing.

I looked on in horror, unable to turn away. My mother screamed that they take her instead, but they did not listen as they pulled her off of the stage. What had I done?

I killed my father.

"Get him out of my sight." The man said before pain reignited in the back of my head and the world went black once more.

 

I awoke to the sound of glass shattering. My eyes snapped open and took in a room that I did not recognize. I was in a bed. This was my room, I somehow knew. Posters covered the walls and there was a desk pressed into the corner. I stood up as another crash came and a yell that sounded like my mom. What was happening?

I ran out of the room and down stairs, following the noise.

"This is all your fault!" My mother screamed. It was coming from the kitchen. I wasn't sure how I knew that considering I had never seen the house before, and yet I found myself turning the corner at the bottom of the stairs, walking through a disheveled looking living room and coming face to face with my mother and…

Chara was in the kitchen as well. For some reason that felt wrong. I almost didn't recognize him at first. He looked older, taller. Then I realized that I was eye level with him still. What was going on?

My brother had his back pressed to the wall. He didn't notice me as I came into the room. Fire burst around him as I was trying to out what I was seeing. I reacted quickly, sending the fire away with magic then looked to the source.

It had been my mother; she had attacked him. My mom looked frantic. She held her hand up, poised at my brother, and was breathing heavily. "What is going on?" I demanded.

"Asriel, go back upstairs." My mom said without looking at me.

"Asriel help me, please. I don't-" Chara began to plead.

"Shut up!" My mother roared. "Do not dare say anything. I have had enough of your lies. You were supposed to help us make peace, but all you have done is give them control over us!" And just like that, the memories came to me. Leaving the Underground, meeting humans for the first time, the slow decay of our rights and that horrible day where I killed my father. It had only gotten worse after that. Mom was trying her hardest on her own to resist, but it wasn't enough. Now, monsters were practically under martial law. Mom had no authority anymore. Magic was essentially outlawed. The only amount of freedom for monsters left came from being brought into a human household. We were little more than pets to humans at that point. Mom and I had been granted special permission to live alone because of our status, but our lives were little better. "It is just like it was before we were sealed away… No, it is even worse." My mother went on. "You should have just stayed away from us. You should have never come back!"

Chara tried to take a step forward. "Mom, I-"

"Do not dare call me that!" she screamed. Flames sprung up around her again. "You are no child of mine."

I stepped in before anything else could happen, cutting her off from Chara. She looked up at me in disbelief. "Asriel? Why… How could you?"

"I don't know what's going on here," I said, "but it's gone far enough."

"How can you defend him? He killed your father!"

I shook my head. "No, I did that…"

"Because of the world _he_ created for us." She argued. "I should have seen it a long time ago. Now it is time to put an end to it."

With a thought, the flames were gone. My destruction magic worked on more than just solid objects. A tied off bubble of it would prevent her from summoning any more. After, I bound her in air. She didn't resist, she simply looked remorseful. "All my life, this is the end for us I feared more than any other: the rot of our very existence; the loss of everything that makes us who we are." She looked up at me. "I see know that your father was one of the lucky ones. He did not have to live to see this day."

A crash came from the other side of the house. People flooded the room moments later, wearing all black with reflective masks over their faces. Guns were pointed at me and my mother. "Put your hands up!" One of them demanded. I did so, releasing my mother from her bonds as I did. She did not raise her hands. She didn't move. They demanded the same again.

"Do your worst." She told them. "It cannot be anything compared to what I have already suffered." Fire shot out at the intruders. They did not even reach them before cracks rang through the kitchen. My mother fell and the intruders lowered smoking guns before moving to grab me, forcing me to my knees.

"No!" Chara shouted. "He was just trying to help me. He's fine." Strangely, his words made them let me go. I didn't care. I didn't even look up from the floor. Tears fell to the tile. Another hand came to rest on my shoulder. I knew it was my brother. "I'm sorry," he said. "I had to do this. I had found evidence that she was planning to revolt. I came to try to put a stop to it before it got out of hand. I didn't want it to end like this."

The pieces of what Chara said came together slowly. I turned my head to look up at him, eyes wide with horror. "You did this?" I whispered.

"I didn't want to," he said flatly, almost regretfully, "but when she attacked me I had no choice. The laws are clear. She did this to herself."

Anger swelled up within me. I let out a growl and leapt to my feet. I was on the ground again before I realized I had even been struck. I was left looking at my mother. She fell to dust as I watched. One of the men came over and ground her soul into the floor, mumbling a curse about boss monsters.

As my vision faded, I watched my brother depart with the others. He did not even look back.

 

When I awoke next, I was standing at a table, surrounded by other monsters. This time, I knew everything from the beginning. I was king; I had been for a long time now. I had inherited a kingdom that was all but extinct. I looked around the tiny room we were all squeezed into. There were no windows in the concrete walls that surrounded us. This was our last place of refuge, buried deep underground, away from the prying eyes of humans. How ironic that was.

"We must do something about this madness!" Demanded one of the monsters. I was only half paying attention. None of this mattered. Never mind that everyone in that room was risking their lives just by being there, anything they said would change nothing.

"We have had this argument countless times before," another responded. "There is nothing we _can_ do. This meeting is not about that. This is about leaving, finding a way to escape."

"They'll never let us go. You all realize that, right?" A third voice added. "They would be lost without their… pets."

"Nevertheless, we must try something," the second voice went on. "If only to leave our children to a better fate."

Children. Once more I am reminded that I am the last of my kind; the last boss monster; the last hope of being able to stand up to the human's power even the slightest bit. What would monsters do when I was gone? No, we were already well past the point of resistance. My death would change nothing. My leadership was merely a thing of morale, and it barely worked as that anymore.

"So we're just going to let the humans win?" The first voice raged.

"They have already won!" The third of them shouted. "Can't you see that?"

"Even if we do manage to escape," the first voice went on as if they hadn't been interrupted, "they would simply hunt us down again." The room remained silent as the monster paused. "We are only delaying the inevitable! We need to fight back! Show the humans that there is only so far that they can push us."

"Can't you see you are merely pushing us to our deaths?" The second voice argued.

"Better to be dead than to remain like this." The first voice said coldly. "The queen had known that."

I slammed my hand down on the table. Every eye snapped up to me immediately. "We do nothing." I told them.

"But, your highness, with this last vote that has passed, they could kill us without punishment if they could prove probable cause, and the conditions for it are so loose that-"

"It doesn't matter. We do nothing."

"But, sire, we must do something! We-"

"There is nothing to do!" I shouted. "Running gets us nothing. Fighting back now gets us nothing. We would be killed before we could accomplish anything."

"So, what then? We let them step all over us until there is nothing of us left?"

I breathed out, feeling like it was somehow the last time I would ever be able to do that. "That is the best fate we can hope for now."

They said nothing more. I walked out of the room without dismissing the meeting. I didn't care anymore.

They didn't listen to me. Even monsters will not remain docile if pushed hard enough. All around the world uprisings sprung up. Each of them was snuffed out before they could accomplish anything, just as I knew they would. But that did not dissuade others. Slowly monsters were killed to the point of extinction. Those few that remained were killed for fear that they would inevitably do the same as their brothers if left alone long enough.

Eventually, I was the only one left. I had returned to the Underground, trying to immerse myself in memories of happier days and ignore the hell that existed above. One day, my brother found me. I didn't even recognize him it had been so long. I didn't blame him for what happened. I blamed only myself. If I had been a better king, a better prince, a better brother, perhaps things would have been different.

Or, perhaps not. Perhaps my decisions made no difference in the grand scheme of things, and I was arrogant to think that they did. I remember spending a great deal of time wondering about that.

When Chara found me, sitting in the courtyard at the base of the castle all those years later, trying to recall the days long gone when I used to run through them with my biggest worry being whether I had practiced sword forms to Durga's standard, he smiled down at me. "Do you see now?" he said to me, softly. "Do you see what your morals amount to?" He leaned in close. I was frozen by that smile. It held a madness I did not remember in my brother. "Nothing." He whispered in my ear. And then everything faded away.

 

It felt like I had lived a thousand of those lives. All of them vastly different, and yet at their heart the same. Every time I tried to make a decision, it was meant to cause the least amount of strife, the least death, but every time I was wrong. They were choices I had to make where there were no right answers. I killed my parents, my brother, and every monster I had ever known, over and over. Some lives I lived through more than once, and I remembered how they had gone the previous times. I tried to make different choices, but in the end it was always the same.

There are times when I think that this is merely another one of those lives. That I am still stuck in that cycle, living another part of that endless struggle to find the right answers. But eventually, I came back. My hands hit dirt, crushing flowers and scattering petals around me. The present came back to me. My hand went to my side. There was no wound, but there was pain, so much pain.

Tears came next. I wailed at what I had done; the amount of death I had caused. It had all felt so real. Was that really all that waited for me? Was that truly fate?

Chara stepped before me. I looked up at him. His blank expression revealed nothing, and yet he seemed to understand what I had seen. He offered a way out of that hell, I saw. Maybe… maybe I should let him have it.

But then, the rest of my memories came back to me, memories of what I had gone through to get here, all to bring my brother back, returned. Their horror seemed almost insignificant to what I had just gone through, and because of that I was able to see them for what they truly were. They had been Chara's memories; his entire life compressed into those few moments. Chara had wanted to scare me off, so he used the scariest thing he could think of: his own suffering. With that realization came the decompression of it all, and then I understood.

I rose to my feet and looked my brother in the eye. He smiled. "Do you realize it now? Do you see that I'm right?"

"No," I told him flatly. His smile slipped. "The only thing I've realized is how strongly you've held on to your hate all this time." It all made sense to me at last. Chara's life had been full of so much misery, it was no wonder they saw the world the way that they did. But that did not mean there wasn't another way; that was only the way he saw it. Well, I refused to. I had walked through the same life and come out the other side. I was living proof that there was another way to respond to that suffering. I had walked through countless other lives as well – many I would have called worse – but those lives were not some vision of the possible future, they were merely conjures of my brother's mind. And I would not let them stop me either. "There is hope for something different," I told him. "You just refuse to see it."

My brother growled and then attacked. His strike was blocked by a sword that appeared in the air between us. Chara looked at it in shock.

I smirked. I had remembered that none of this was real, it was all in my head. I was still climbing the mountain. I could almost see the truth of it, like it was in the corner of my eye. I realized it had always been there. And if Chara could control this place, then so could I.

Chara disappeared and reappeared at my side, attacking again. I sent myself somewhere else as well. "I'm sorry, Chara." I told him. "You were right about one thing. This was all my fault. I tried to show you that you could let go of your past. At times I thought you had, but I see now that you didn't. I didn't try hard enough to get you to see. Humans are not as bad as you think. I have all of the evidence I need to that fact standing in front of me.

"You told me once that you wanted to be a better person. You have the ability to be who you want to be, you just have to let go of your hate first."

Chara stared at me, confused, and then he started to laugh. "Is that some kind of a joke? How is it, after everything, you can still be so stupid? I am the perfect example of what humans do to each other, what they make each other into!"

I shook my head. "No, Chara, you're different than that. You're different than _him_. I still believe that."

"No!" Chara's fist clenched at his side. "This world has shown me nothing but pain! And now that it all that I have left to give."

"It's not the world's fault you're like this Chara. It is only you. It's your choice to move forward, no one else's. I have seen your life, lived through it myself. I understand now what you went through for so long. But you need to choose to not let that past rule you."

Chara attacked again. His blow hit nothing but the air between us. "You are dooming monsters if you keep down this path. I tried to show you that."

"That's not what this is about." I told him. "It's not about a choice between humans and monsters. It's about the life _you_ choose to live. It's about how _you_ choose to view the world. Humans aren't the enemy. Not monsters'. Not yours. This fight isn't about which of our races is doomed. If you keep going like this… you're only dooming yourself."

"No!" Chara roared. He tried to push through my shield, but he could not. "They deserve to die for what they did to me. They all do." I pushed my brother back with the air and he slid across the flowers, but he remained standing. "I will not give up," he said. "Not after coming so close."

"Neither will I," I told him. "I won't give up on you for as long as I live."

The world around us changed again. The field of golden flowers melted away and in its place was a large plateau. The rock fell away around us and the sun sat high in the sky. Below, I could hear the sound of vast armies clashing: the ring of metal on metal mixed with a swarm of battle cries. It was the scene I had imagined in my mind every time Chara and I battled when we played pretend.

Chara shock lasted only a moment as he looked around himself, and then he smirked. "Fine," he said. "Perhaps beating you on your own terms will show you how useless this is." I watched my brother change much as the world had. He became taller, older. His hair grew long and became tied behind his back. The old striped shirt he had stolen from me changed into armor made of red-dyed leather. A black cloak appeared across his shoulders. The delta rune became embossed on his chest. A second knife appeared in his hand.

I changed myself as well, returning to the body I had gained in absorbing Chara's soul. Instead of robes this time, I wore armor modeled after my fathers. The overlapping plates of metal clinked as the came to rest over me. They seemed to weigh nothing. A sword came to my hand, a shield to the other.

"That's not your usual way of fighting." Chara said. His new voice sounded odd.

"I have no usual way of fighting. I do it only because I must."

"In spite of everything, I still envy you, Asriel. I still wish, more than anything, that I could see the world the way you do. But that doesn't change the fact that your compassion is wasted on humanity. You've seen them now, looked into their hearts, seen what their world is like. You hate them, I can see it. And yet you choose to carry on like this."

"The only humans I hate are the ones who turned you into this. The rest do not matter to me. Yes, I am frustrated by what I saw in them – the fact that they could let things get that bad… But we _can_ fix that. We will."

"Why are you so ready to try to redeem them?" my brother screamed at me. "After everything they did to me, why are you so willing to help them?"

"In the city, when we were watching the man, I had said that the reason for his actions were his past. But you said that wasn't right, that he still had a choice. How is what you're doing now any different than him?" Chara flinched at my words and he had none in return. I smiled at him. "Let go, Chara. Let go so we can go home and figure out a way to do this right."

My brother lunged, rage in his eyes. I blocked with my sword so I could stare into his gaze, drink it in. I was not afraid of it anymore. "There is only one way that I can let go." He said.

"Fighting won't help anything," I told him, "it never does. But if that is what it has come to," The air lit up as lightning descended on my brother. He vanished just before it could hit him. His ability to see magic had not failed him yet. "Then so be it."

This time, I did not wait for him to recover. I followed after, sword changed into spear in my hand. Its length became wreathed in fire as I threw it. The flames grew and consumed the spear in the air, becoming a twisting torrent of destruction. It hit Chara head on, but he held his ground. His cloak whipped out behind him but it was the only thing that even seemed effected.

I didn't spare a thought for how he had done it – I had already done enough that day that I could not explain. Another sword sprung into being in my hand as I came to stand before my brother once more. I cleaved it down at him without hesitation. Chara brought up his knife to block and I destroyed it with a thought. All that remained to block my strike was his hand which proved to not be enough. The blade took three of his fingers before stopping an inch from his face. Then it refused to move.

I tried to destroy the weapon, thinking it bound in air, but it didn't work. Chara smirked and lifted his other hand up, still holding its own knife. As it rose, so too did the sword. I let it go and sprang back. As I did, an arsenal of weapons appeared around me. No two were alike; there were swords and lances and spears and anything else I could think to make in that moment. Chara's bonding magic was not to be trifled with. I needed to overwhelm him before he could really have a chance to use it.

I sent all of the weapons down on my brother with as much force as I could put behind it. I had never known such magic before – I had only ever seen Undyne do it – but I did not question, it was a tool to be used and I would take every advantage I could get. Now that this had begun, I would see it done properly.

A number of the weapons struck the ground around my brother, kicking up clouds of dust that obscured him from sight. Below me, it sounded like one of the armies had let out a cheer. I could not tell whose. As the dust settled, Chara still stood exactly where he had. A number of the weapons still hung in the air around him. They vibrated frantically at their speed being so unnaturally stopped. He still smirked. "You're going to have to do better than that." He said, flexing his injured hand, which was no longer missing any fingers.

One of the weapons, a halberd, spun towards me. It shot out and struck the ground at my feet. The world seemed to split where it landed. The plateau fell away like it were wax someone had held a flame to. I sent myself to the side before I started to fall. As I looked back, a whole third of the plateau was gone, a wedge beginning nearly at my brother's feet.

"Why?" he questioned as he shoved the remaining weapons into the ground at his feet before they disappeared. "After everything, why do you continue to fight me?"

"I refuse to believe that killing humans is the right answer, or killing anyone for that matter. Let alone believing it is the only answer." I sent myself at him as I finished. I was done talking, and I knew he was only trying to distract me. A new weapon, my father's trident, came to my hand and I thrust it at my brother. It fell away to nothing before it reached him, the shield and my armor as well.

I looked down at my now empty hands in shock. That was my resonance. How had he done that?

"You and I are one now, Asriel." Chara said as if he were still reading my mind. "And now I truly know everything about you."

The world shifted once more, until we were standing across from each other in a city street. Buildings stretched up to touch the sky in near perfect lines on either side of us. The street itself was empty.

"I will admit," Chara said as he turned to walk around me. Smug satisfaction filled his every word and movement. "There may be one other answer; a way to keep humans in line. The only thing they respond to: fear. But nothing short of our power would keep them cooed. For it to work, every monster would need to become what we have. That way, not every human has to die, only some. Is that a better solution for you?"

I quickly buried my shock at the last few moments. "No, but that does not matter."

"Why?"

Chara thought he was winning. I would show him that I would not be cooed so easily either. "Because I know we can do better than that."

My brother turned back to me. "You really think you know everything… What if you were to try and fail? What if, after trying everything to be nice and helpful to them, humans still attacked and hated monsters, what then?"

"If _all_ else failed, then you would have your wish." I had realized that somewhere along the way. If things really did turn out the way that Chara said, I would not put the lives of any monsters in any more danger than I could help. But that wasn't admitting he was right, that was simply acting like the king I would one day become. You had to prepare for the worst, and hope it never came to it. "You'll have your wish in that case," I told him, "but I refuse to act preemptively. Thinking like that is what caused much of the problems humans faced in the past. They were too quick to lose hope."

"And how would you know when there's no hope left."

"I'd just know."

"Not good enough." Chara said. "Too many monsters would die that way, don't you see? Do you really think that's right? Would you really risk monsters just to save a few humans you don't even know?"

I redid my defenses, and set a few things up to counter whatever my brother had been readying while he tried to distract me. "You said it yourself, Chara. There is no right or wrong, only strength. And I will use every bit of mine to ensure peace."

"As will I." Chara said, taking up stance once more. "Let us see whose peace is stronger."

We fought, like we had envisioned in our minds countless time before, with the earth shattering beneath our feet and the heavens crying out above as reality itself shattered at the strength of our blows. The sounds of our imaginary armies had followed us to the city, and were drowned out by our own battle. I imagined them looking to us from all around. Their own battle halted as they took in the fight of their kings.

We moved faster than the lightning we summoned to strike each other down. I was caught up in the chaos of it. There was no time for thought behind action. I struck out with magic and blade on instinct alone. I remember the landscape around us changing several times; I remember cities and mountains falling to a single swipe of my sword. On and on we fought and neither of us slowed. Any blow we landed on one another was there one instant and gone the next, barely long enough to even feel the pain of it. Neither of us waivered. We kept fighting, to prove not only which of us was stronger, but to prove which of the forces that drove us were stronger: my love, or his hate.

After an eternity, we broke away. I took in my surroundings for the first time in a long time. We were on the roof of the assembly hall in Home, but there was no dome above our heads; the sky shone almost like a jewel above us. The sun was setting, only half still remained over the horizon. The ground stretched out flat as a plate beyond the ancient city.

"This is pointless, don't you realize?" My brother said, drawing me back to him. "We feed off of the same power now. This fight will drag on forever with neither of us tiring as long as our will remains."

I nodded in understanding. What we were doing should have been enough to exhaust us at least a hundred times over by then. Yet, despite his words, I could feel that I was becoming tired, little by little. Was Chara feeling the same and was simply better at hiding it? Did that really change anything?

"This will not end until one of us submits." He went on. "Otherwise this will continue, meanwhile monsters will continue to rot underground and humanity will continue to destroy the world around them. So, Asriel, which do you chose?"

I knew my brother's words to be true, just as I knew that I would never submit to him. We were stuck at an impasse, an impossible battle with no possible winner. And yet, all the same, this needed to end. Even if it were not the true face of this battle, the fate of monsters and humans both hung in the balance. But what other way was there?

My brother still refused to let go of his hate. Even though he had said he wanted to be a better person, his actions had proven that to be a lie time and time again.

Perhaps, it was simply impossible…

I hated admitting it to myself, especially since I had felt so close time after time, but if having people around him who genuinely loved him, who wanted to help show him another way, was not enough to make him let go, then nothing would.

That is what I realized in the end. My brother's hate _was_ stronger. And whether that had been true since the beginning, or only after what we had become, I knew what needed to be done.

I looked down at the sword in my hand, and suddenly the answer became clear. "Neither of us should have this power." I said to myself.

"What?" Chara said, overhearing me.

I held his gaze once more. "We hold the fate of the world on our shoulders." I said. "No one should have that power. And if we can't come to an agreement on how to use it, then no one wins."

I brought my sword up, point poised at my own chest. "What are you doing?" Chara cried.

"If what you say is true, then I won't try to stop you anymore. But that's not a world that I want to live in. You said we both draw from the same power now. I wonder… if one of us were to die, what would happen to the other? Would they be able to control this power on their own, or would it tear them apart?" I thrust the sword towards my body.

"No!" Chara shouted. He ran to me, trying to make me stop. As he drew close, I turned the sword away from myself and ran my brother through.

I caught him as he practically fell on me in shock. I could feel blood running down my hand. Somehow, I knew that meant it had worked. Slowly Chara looked up at me. "You… you…" he stammered.

"I'm sorry Chara." I did not cry, not that time. "I see now that you weren't lying before, that hate really was the only thing keeping you going. But it's over. Now you can rest."

Chara coughed. Blood trickled down his chin as he looked up at me again. "That's twice you've killed me now." He said.

"No, Chara. You did all of this to yourself. I gave you every chance for this to end differently, and each time you refused. But it's okay now. We're almost home." I could see it, in the corner of my eye. We were back in the cave that held the barrier. It would not be long now.

I let the sword disappear and Chara fell to his knees, clutching his chest. For a moment he was still, and then his shoulders started to shake. I thought he was coughing again, but then it became louder and I realized it was something else. My brother threw back his head and roared with laughter. "You really are an idiot." He said once he stopped. "You thought that would work?"

He slowly got to his feet. "Our souls are one now. Killing me won't simply cut me away. If one of us dies, we both die." A wash of exhaustion suddenly came over me, and I had to fight just to stay on my feet. "That's right," Chara continued. "You've killed us both this time. Well, no… not exactly. Unfortunately there is another factor that neither of us anticipated."

He spread his hands out, smile growing wider as he did. The wound in his chest was gone. "There's more that connects us than just our souls."

My eyes went wide, and my brother laughed once more at my reaction. "Confused? Do you remember that first day we went to this city? When I saved you from falling into that hole? It was the first time I used my power; a thread connecting you to me. I left that tie, once we were pulled back up. I left it so that I could always know you were there. And now, now it will make sure we stay together, forever.

"You would have killed us both, if not for that connection. Now it's the only thing keeping us both alive, and it is not something you can get rid of so easily. Do you see now, Asriel? I will never stop. Not until I have what I want. I won't let either of us die until that happens."

My legs finally gave out. I looked up at my brother's triumphant smile. Was that really the end of it? I asked myself. Had I failed once again because of an invisible thread of magic?

In my anger, I lashed out with my own power, hoping by chance that it would catch it. But it was no use; my resonance did not work on spells I could not see. My brother laughed once more at my futile efforts, and I wished more than ever that I had my brother's ability to see magic.

_We feed off of the same power now._ Those words rang in my head. We were connected, he had said; our souls were one. My brother had been able to use my resonance against me before. If he could use my powers, then I should be able to use his.

And just like that, the world… shifted. Our place did not change that time, but my perception of it did. It was as if a new layer had been superimposed over it. Lines of color swirled around me. They wove between each other and connected to everything. I instantly began to understand how this strange imaginary world was working. I couldn't explain it though, not unless you saw it yourself.

It was overwhelming. There was so much that I couldn't see before. I tried to sift through it, push some of it aside and regain a measure of clarity. I focused on me and my brother. Then, I saw it: a thin red line drawn between us. It was almost too thin to see, with its end sticking out of my chest, and yet I could tell it held us together stronger than any force in the universe. I waved my hand through it, and it passed through as if it were not really there at all. I looked up at Chara. The other end of the thread ended in his own chest. His expression darkened as he watched me. "What are you…?" he began. Then, he knew.

Before he could react, I struck out with my resonance once more, dissolving the thread. As it fell away, I felt something snap within me, and that imaginary world around us began to melt. I suddenly felt as if all of the pain and exhaustion that should have built up during our fight suddenly crashed down on me, and I fought just to stay conscious.

"What have you done?" Chara screamed, looking as if he were in just as much pain.

"End this." I said, biting back the fire that threatened to consume me. I had to hold on just a little longer, to make sure it was done.

"No!" He roared. "This is not over! This will never be over." Despite his words, I could see my brother's panic. He knew this was it. He looked around frantically as if his surroundings would offer him some way out, but I knew there was no hope now.

Then, his panic melted. He smirked, "I'm afraid you've failed again, Asriel." He said softly. "We'll see each other again. Someday." And then, he was gone.

I felt something happen when he left, I'm not sure what. I don't think I even know it now, but I knew he was gone, not dead, but gone. And there are times when I swear I can still feel him out there, somewhere.

As Chara fled, that fantasy world shattered and I was pulled out of my head. I immediately fell to my knees. I felt more exhausted that I could ever remember. Chara's vacant face stared up at me once more from the bundle that had fallen from my arms. Around me, the world pulsed with white light. I was back on the other side of the barrier, I realized. I had been able to at least make it that far, but it was not far enough.

As I looked down at my brother once more, I fought back against my exhaustion. A part of me knew I was dying. So be it. It was what I deserved after everything I had done, but not yet. "I'm sorry…" I whispered to my brother, struggling to my feet. "There's still one more thing we have to do." Chara's vacant eyes stared back at me. I knew I should have felt something in that moment, but there was nothing left for me to feel. "I can't leave them with nothing," I explained. "Otherwise they'll make the same mistakes we did. I have to tell them what I saw." I looked to the doorway that led beyond the barrier. "Then we can both rest."


	12. The Last Day

Do you want to know what it feels like to die? At least, for monsters?

At least, for me?

Honestly, I don't think I could really describe it. I was already so numb from losing Chara that I didn't really care what was happening to me. As that imaginary world shattered and my brother faded away, I was left torn to pieces. My memory of the time after is fragmented, even compared to everything else. After collapsing just inside of the barrier, the next time my eyes opened I was in the throne room. Mom and Dad were standing in front of me. They kept their distance unsure what to do. They were afraid, I could see it.

The next moment, I collapsed. The sight of my parents robbed my legs of the last of their ability to stand and my head hit the floor. My vision blurred, but I barely felt anything. I couldn't move; my body felt like a rock was crushing it. I could sense everything starting to slip from me, and I fought to keep going just a little longer. It was a battle I was losing, but I couldn't let go. Not yet. Then, I was spun onto my back and Mom was looking down at me.

That look she wore as she knelt over my dying body is seared into my mind. The panic, the desperation; that glimmer that says 'I would do anything, give up anything, so that this moment would end.'

Yes, I know that look very well. And there is more than just her son dying in her arms that could cause it. But, I didn't know that then; that came later. And so, as she held me, I was left with the thought that I had done the worst thing possible to her. I felt guilt well up inside of me for the last time, pushing through the fog of numbness, giving me one more moment of strength to be able to leave them with something, anything.

Dad appeared at my other side. They were both kneeling over me now; Mom had her arms under my head, lifting me up just enough that I could see the doorway back to the barrier behind them. They were saying something; they looked like they were arguing. I couldn't hear what they said. I didn't even try to listen. I gathered my strength, hoping it would be enough.

I struggled with getting my mouth to move for what felt like a long time. At first only noise came out, but it was enough for them to turn their attention back to me. Finally, the words came. "I… I saw… the surface." At least, that's what I think I said. I realized I couldn't hear myself either. But I went on either way; what I had to tell them was important, maybe the most important thing in the history of monsters. "I tried… but… I can't."

My mother leaned down to hug me, cutting me off. I tried to push her away so I could tell her what I had learned, but it was no use.

When she finally did break away, her attention was on my father. They were yelling at each other this time, I could tell. I still don't know about what, but I hated seeing it. This wasn't the way it was going to end. I couldn't let what I learned die with me, but there was nothing I could do to turn their attention away from each other. I couldn't shout, I couldn't move.

Finally, my mother turned back to me. By that point I could barely see enough to make out her face. How much longer did I have left? I wondered. She lowered my head and held her hands over me to try to heal me, but I knew it was already too late. There was only one thing left I could do. "The surface." I whispered again, using what little strength the healing gave me. My mother stopped, leaning down so she could hear. Was my voice really that weak? My vision began to fade into darkness along the edges. I knew I had to be quick. "Humans," I struggled, hoping they would understand. "They don't have souls. We can't leave." I wished I had some idea whether or not I even managed to say any of that. I never asked, and it hardly matters anymore.

Before I was even done, I was blind. I felt like I was floating, the weight of my body fell away and a chill began to creep in on my consciousness. As that chill grew, there was this single moment of clarity. Everything that had happened, everything that was happening, finally hit me. I was dying. I didn't want to die. I was scared. A thousand hands seemed to reach out of the darkness and grab me, pulling me deeper. And then,

Nothing.

.

What happened in between, I was told later. It was all less than a second for me. I fell to dust in my parents' arms, and they could do nothing but weep. They had lost two children in the span of a day, and all of their hope along with them. The next day, they announced what had happened to the kingdom and the whole of the Underground mourned in silence for days.

The funeral was held in the throne room, for both my brother and I. Chara's body was laid out in the center of the room. Golden flowers sprung up from the stone as the ceremony commenced, seemingly from nothing. They surrounded my brother and continued to grow and bloom as my mother said her piece. My dust was spread over my brother and then my father had his turn to speak.

In the days between my death and the funeral, the guilt and anger had eaten away at him until he could think of nothing other than revenge. I didn't even think he was capable of such a thing. But, as it turned out, I knew as little about him as you do. He declared war on humans before the entire kingdom while he stood over my grave, and the entire Underground cried out for blood.

My mother was appalled. She could not stand to see my father or her people act that way, and she would not allow me or Chara be used as a symbol in some petty war. She disappeared one night, stealing my brother's body with her, and fled to the ruins of Home.

She buried my brother beneath the tree we used to play around in the yard of our old home where she stayed, trying to find her own answers for what to do next.

My father demanded a way to break the barrier be found. He turned all resources towards it, but it seemed an impossible task. There was only one way to break the barrier: seven human souls, the same power that formed it. And yet, everything was tried. Including an innocent little experiment to see if something without a soul could gain the will to live.

.

So, you might be thinking to yourself, "If that's how everything ended, why do you want him back?"

While I was still alive, so much of my time was consumed by thinking about the mistakes I made, and the things I could have done differently. That age old question – 'what if?' – ate away at my mind. And now, now I have the power to explore every one of those fantasies. And I have.

Every. Single. One.

So, why do I want him back? It's simple really. He's the only puzzle I have left to solve. I've exhausted every other eventuality with every other monster in the Underground. I've learned everything about them; what makes them tick, what breaks them, what builds them up. They've lost all interest to me. My brother is the only one I have left to figure out.

I can still feel him. He's out there, somewhere. A part of that connection we once had still remains, I know it. He vanished before I had the chance to burn it all away. And yet, I've searched everywhere, done everything I can think of, and I feel like I'm no closer than when I started…

But I will never give up. I _will_ get him back. He said himself that we would see each other again. And next time… Maybe next time I'll even let him have his wish.

.

.

.

Oh? What's this?

It seems you've kept me busy for quite some time; much longer than I had intended, at least. But not long enough I'm afraid. That was quite the clever trick though, I will give you that.

Sorry everyone. It's been fun, but I'm afraid something far more important has come up.

What? You still want to know what happened next? Heh, my brother was more right about you than I thought. Well, I think I'll let you decide what happened next by yourselves. After all, there's more than one ending to that particular story. And all of them are true.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp, that's it for this one folks.
> 
> To those who left them, thank you for the kind words. And to everyone who read this story, thank you for giving it the time of day. I hope you enjoyed it, and I hope you are looking forward to the next one.


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